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A STORY 

ILLUSTRATING HOW ONE OF NATURe's NOBLEMEN 
WAS SAVED FROM THE DEMON OF DRINK. 


/ r By S. AETHUE: 

Author of Three Years in a Man-Trap,'' Danger," “ Woman to the Rescue," 

^^Cast Adrift," etc,, etc. 


'dec 15 1882) 

. :soJ.h(ltJ. %ij 


Cottage Library Publishing House, 

PHILADELPHIA, BOSTON, NEW YORK, HARTFORD, CINCINNATI, ST. LOUIS, 
CHICAGO, SAN FRANCISCO, KANSAS CITY, 

ATLANTA 


V •T's sr- V* 


Copyright, 1881, by Hubbard Brob. 


PUBLISHERS’ PREFACE. 


I N this work we have one of those intensely wrought tem- 
perance stories for which the author is so distinguished. 

In the conception and execution of this story, he has taken 
higher ground than usual, and lifted the subject of temperance 
into the region of spiritual laws and forces. Rarely has the 
insidious growth and overmastering power of appetite, or the 

* 

desperate and prolonged struggle of an enslaved man for free- 
dom, been more powerfully exhibited than in the hero of this 
story — a man of education, social standing, high honor and the 
tenderest home affections." 

We follow him in his downward course, step by step, with an 
almost breathless interest and suspense — glad and hopeful for 
every new effort that he makes to overcome his pitiless enemy, 
and disappointed and sorrowful at each successive failure — 
until manhood is eclipsed, love extinguished, and honor a thing 
of the past ; and we turn away from him at the prison door, 
our hope as dead as his own. 

But the man is not lost. No ; there is One who can save to 
the uttermost all who come unto Him. And by Him this man 
is saved and made a power for good in the salvation of many 
who had once been in the same fearful bondage from which, in 
the name and by the power of God, he had been able to get 
free. Can any one who reads what befell this man in the cell, 

(v) 


vi 


PREFACE. 


where society had shut him away as a foul and guilty thing, 
caring little whether he lived or died, do so with dry eyes? 
We think not. It is something to stir the heart profoundly. 
In this story the author deals not alone with the curse of strong 
drink, but with the means of cure, and shows that even with 
the lowest and the vilest, reform is possible. 


CONTENTS. 


CHAPTER I. 

In the Demon’s Grip 9 

CHAPTER II. 

Breaking Off. 22 

CHAPTER III. 

Agony at Home 35 

CHAPTER IV. 

All Gone 44 

CHAPTER V. 

Almost in Despair 57 

CHAPTER VI. 

Desperate Struggling 76 

. CHAPTER VII. 

Anxious Fears 89 

CHAPTER VIII. 

Deceiving Himself. 100 

CHAPTER IX. 

Cast Out 118 

CHAPTER X. 

The Floods Rising 142 

CHAPTER XI. 

A Headlong Plunge 156 

vii 


CONTENTS. 


viii 

CHAPTER XII. 

In Prison 172 

CHAPTER XIII. 

Self-Trust Dead 193 

CHAPTER XIV. 

At the Reformatory 205 

CHAPTER XV. 

A New and Better Life 219 

CHAPTER XVI. 

Fighting the Good Fight 233 

CHAPTER XVII. 

Help in Prayer 248 

CHAPTER XVHI. 

Gospel Temperance W ork 261 

CHAPTER XIX. 

W onderful Reformations 278 

CHAPTER XX. 

Conquering and to Conquer .... 296 

CHAPTER XXI. 

Sowing Good Seed 307 

CHAPTER XXH. 

Solid Arguments ....327 

CHAPTER XXIII. 

The Evidence Complete * 344 

CHAPTER XXIV. 

The Happy Conclusion 363 


LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS. 


PAGE 

T. S. Arthur (Steel) Frontispiece. 

The Devil of drink has seized me, 11 

Soda water for me, 45 

Alexander Granger sitting on the pavement, 165 

All that the demon has left, 109 

He fell with a dull, heavy sound, 119 

Yes, worse than sick, 197 

No wine for me, replied Amy, 309 

By their fruits ye shall know them, . - 339 


CHAPTER I. 

IN THE demon’s GRIP. 

H e came in so noiselessly that I heard neither 
the opening nor shutting of the door, and 
only became aware of his presence when I felt his 
hand on my shoulder. 

Shall I ever forget the face into which I looked ? 
A face so marred since I had seen it last; so pale, 
so exhausted, so helpless and despairing, that I was 
not only shocked by the sight but filled with inex- 
pressible pain. The hand which he had laid upon 
me was trembling violently. 

“ Why Granger ! ” I exclaimed, as I started to my 
feet. “What does this mean ? ” 

I saw the. muscles of his face quiver and spasms 
run about his lips, as he made an effort to reply. 
“It can’t be possible that you — ” 

I held back, from an instinct of delicacy, the 
words that were coming to my lips. 

“Have fallen so low?” he said, in a husky, 
shaking voice, finishing the sentence which I had 
left incomplete. Then, with a steadier utterance: 
“But it is all too S9,dly true, Mr. Lyon. The devil 
of drink has seized me, and I cannot get free from 
the grip of his terrible hand ! ” 


9 


10 


SAVED 


“Don’t say that, my friend. You must resist this 
devil and, like all other devils, when met by resist- 
ance, he will flee from you.” 

A short, bitter laugh, and then: “He isn’t one of 
that kind.” 

But, surely. Granger, you will not give up your 
manhood to the vice of an appetite?” 

“Vice! That’s a little, easy sort of a word, and 
doesn’t seem to mean much, does it?” 

He was sitting, now, and I standing just in front 
of the chair he had taken. As I looked at him 
steadily, I saw more distinctly than at first the rav- 
ages which intemperance had made upon his finely- 
cut, and once handsome features. I had not met 
him before for many months. 

“To the demands of an appetite? Let me make 
the proposition stronger,” said I. 

“Vice, demand, curse; anything you choose. It’s 
all the same.” 

“But the will-power is above them all — can break 
the bonds of appetite, and let the man go free.” 

I saw a change begin passing over his face. 

“Free I What would I not give to be free I ” 

“Resolve, and it is done! In a man’s will lies 
his strength. Neither Heaven nor hell can move 
him if he will not. Set your will against this appe- 
tite, and will shall be master.” 

He looked at me with a gathering wonder in his 
eyes, as though a new thought were dawning upon 
his mind. His mouth became a little firmer; and 


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A8 BY FIRE. ^ 

he raised his almost crouching form to an erecter 
attitude. 

“If he will not — will not.” 

“Just so, my friend. If he will not, all hell can- 
not move him. Self-mastery ! Every man has this 
power. I have it; you have it. It is the common 
inheritance of all men.” 

“An inheritance sold, alas! too often for a mess 
of pottage,” Granger answered, bitterly. “And 
when once sold, has it not gone hopelessly out of 
our possession ? ” 

“No. Freedom to will is a birthright which no 
man living can wholly alienate. He may at any 
time re-assert his right of inheritance. You can do 
it now — can set your heel on this serpent of appetite, 
and crush it beneath your tread. Be a man. Gran- 
ger I Let the higher things that are in you hold the 
lower things in subjection. Let reason and judg- 
ment rule the appetites and passions, as a master 
rules his servants. This is the common order of 
life. God has given us reason as a ruler; and we 
must see that no usurper gain a foothold in our 
kingdom.” 

As I spoke I saw the signs of strength and confi- 
dence coming into Granger’s eyes. 

“It is because you have let the sensual betray and 
dethrone the rational that you are in so sad a plight 
to-day. Will has gone over to the wrong side.” 

“It shall come to the right side again, Mr. Lyon!” 
His voice had a clear ring. “I see just how it is. 


12 


SAVED 


Will went over to appetite instead of standing firm 
by the side of reason.” 

“Yes; you state the case exactly as it stands,” I 
said. “It was an abuse of freedom, so to speak. 
You were not compelled to drink : for appetite has 
no power above solicitation. It cannot move your 
hand, nor place a glass to your lips. Only the will 
has power over the actions, and so nothing can be 
done without consent of the will.” 

“I see ! I see !” More light and strength coming 
■ into his face. “ It all lies with myself.” 

“ All,” I answered. “ There is no help for you 
outside of your own will. You stand self-centered, 
or equipoised, with freedom to act in the direction 
of any force that draws you, be it good or evil.” 

“ Thank you for all this. I see wherein my peril 
lies, and also the line of a new defence. I will con- 
trol this dreadful appetite ! I will be a man.” 

“But, remember,” I said, “that eternal vigilance 
is the price of safety. Appetite is subtle, as well as 
strong. It is an enemy that never really sleeps.” 

“ I know, I know ! But is not safety worth eter- 
nal vigilance ?” 

There was in his countenance the glow of a rising 
confidence. 

“ Ah, my friend,” he added, as he took my hand 
and held it tightly, “what would I not do or suffer 
to be free from this awful slavery ; from this bond- 
age to death and hell !” 

“ And the way is so plain and so easy,” said I, 


AS BY FIRE. / 


13 


with all the encouragement I was able to throw into 
my voice. “ Just to will to be free ; and then to 
stand up as a man. To say to appetite, ‘ So far and 
no farther !’ ” 

“ It was my good angel who led me here, and who 
put these hopeful words into your mouth, my dear 
old friend!” He spoke with much feeling. “I 
haven’t been home since yesterday. I was in no 
condition to meet my family last night ; and am in 
little better condition this morning. You see, I’ve 
not lost all shame and all consideration.” 

“ You will go home now ?” 

“Yes.” 

I saw a shadow drifting over his face. 

“ Where are you living ?” 

“ Away up town ; hut not as we used to live.” 

“ Shall I go with you ?” 

He did not reply at once ; but the shadows were 
deeper on his face. . 

“ If you will.” There was a returning depression 
in his voice ; and I saw that his nerves, which had 
grown steady under the pressure of new thoughts 
and purposes, were giving way again. He drew a 
hand across his forehead. It was trembling. 

“ You remember Helen ?” he said. 

“ Oh, yes. How is she ?” 

There was something like a gasp, or quick catch- 
ing of the breath. Then, with an effort to control 
his feelings ; “ Not as when you saw her last. Ah I 
sir, what a cruel devil this drink is I” 


14 


SAVED 


“ Cruel as death,” I responded, falling in with his 
thoughts. 

“As death? Oh, noi Death is an angel of 
mercy ; hut drink is a devil i My poor Helen !” 

What grief and tenderness were in his voice as he 
uttered the name of his wife. 

“For her sake. Granger.” 

“ F or her sake !” He spoke with a sudden intense 
earnestness, while a strong light flashed into his 
eyes. “If I were to see a wild beast rushing down 
upon her, do you think I would pause to question 
about consequences to myself? Not for a single 
instant ! What would I not do, and bear, and suffer 
for her sake ! Ah ! sir, she has been a good wife to 
me. So patient", so true, so tender always. And I 
have tried so hard, and fought so hard, for her 
sake.” 

“And now let the new life you are going to lead 
find its highest strength in these three words — For 
her sake. Let the steady will and the better man- 
hood be for her sake. Hold the brief sentence ever 
against your heart; set it ever before your eyes. For 
her sake, my friend !” 

“Yes, for her sake, God bless her!” His voice 
shook, and I saw tears coming into his eyes. 

“What higher strength than this. Surely you 
will stand as a rock against which the maddest bil- 
lows of temptation must break and dissolve into 
foam and spray.” 

“For her sake I will stand ! For her sake, and 


AS BY fibe:_ 


15 


for the sake of my wronged and humiliated children. 
What a wretch I have been ! To fill the lives of 
those I love with shame and sorrow ; and for what ? 
Just to gratify an appetite !” 

“Which, if you will to deny, must always stand 
denied. Keep ever in your thought the true order 
of life, which is the subjection of the sensual to the 
rational. If the sensual is suffered to rule, then will 
anarchy and violence reign in the kingdom ; hut if 
reason keeps her seat of power, order, and peace, 
and happiness will prevail ; and the sensual will he 
as a staff in the hand of Aaron, and not as a biting 
serpent on the ground.” 

“Ah ! yes, it is growing clearer and clearer. All 
danger lies in this infirmity of the will, in this heark- 
ening to the lying voice of a serpent, instead of to 
our God-given reason.” • 

Granger was lifting himself with a more as- 
sured air, and there was a growing strength in his 
face. 

“I must go home now,” he said, rising. 

“And I am to go with you ?” 

Did I betray a doubt in my voice ? Perhaps ; for 
away back and almost out of sight in my mind lay 
a doubt of the new-born strength of this man’s will. 
It might endure until he reached his home, or it 
might yield to enticement by the way. He had not 
yet recovered his manhood. Was still weak, and 
must walk for a time with unsteady steps. All this 
I felt rather than thought. 

2 


16 


SAVED 


He set Ms eyes on me 'witli a keen look just for 
an instant before replying. 

“ If you care to see wbat a poor and wretched 
borne it is.” 

“ I care to give you wbat belp and strength lies 
in my power.” I took my bat as I spoke, and we 
went out together. 

I bad not seen Alexander Granger before for 
nearly a year. He was a lawyer of fine abilities, and 
in the first ten years of bis practice at the bar had 
risen steadily into notice, and been connected, as 
counsel, with many important eases. But, unhappily, 
his social nature led him too often out of the ways 
of safety. It was the old, sad story which has been 
told so many and so many times. Just in the very 
prime of his hfe, the* subtle power of drink began 
to bear him down. If he had taken alarm at the 
first warning he received of the establishment and 
growth of this power, and broken free from it in a 
single resolute effort, all would have been well. 
But here again it was the old story repeated. He 
had faith in his own manhood ; in his ability to go 
just so far and no farther ; to keep on the edge of 
danger and never step across. And he held to this, 
even in the face of one lapse after another, until he 
became the slave of appetite. 

It took years for all this ; for he had a strong, 
tough brain, and great physical energy ; and his 
steadily increasing practice at the bar held him in 
earnest work, and for a long time out of the sphere 


BY FIRE. 


17 


of apparent danger. But no brain can do its best 
under the stimulant of alcohol. There must always 
come a loss of clearness. There may be an increased 
activity, but this very activity, where the reason is 
obscured and interests at the same time imperilled, 
leads too often to disaster. It happened so to Gran- 
ger. In the very height of his popularity he lost a 
case of great importance. His client did not know 
that on the previous night he had been over-free with 
wine at a supper from which he did not get home 
until after the small hours began ; and that before 
coming into court to make his final argument, he 
had been compelled to steady his nerves with a 
glass of brandy. No, they did not know this ; but 
what they did know was, that he failed to bring 
out with logical clearness the strong point in their 
case, and the one on which they chiefly relied. 
Considered as a mere forensic display, it was one of 
the most brilliant ever heard in the court-room, 
and men listened to it breathlessly, admiring its 
fine periods, its exhibition of learning, and its 
wealth of imagery and illustration ; but, while it 
extorted admiration, it failed in the chief essential 
of a legal argument, working no conviction on the 
minds of the twelve men with whom the decision of 
the case rested. 

It was Granger’s first great failure. Did no 
suspicion of the real cause intrude itself upon his 
thoughts ? Yes ; but it was thrust out as false and 
unworthy.' His head was never clearer, nor his 


18 


SAVED 


mind more active. So he declared to himself in 
his quick rejection of the very truth it so much 
concerned him to know. But the incident troubled 
him; and in the face of his effort to look away 
from the real cause of failure, • and to count it as 
nothing, he made an almost involuntary resolution 
to abstain from any free use of stimulants for some 
days before arguing another important case ; and 
for more than a year he acted upon this resolution. 

But his wine at dinner, his exchange of drinking 
courtesies with friends, and his indulgence at sup- 
pers and social parties, gradually depraved his 
appetite, and it grew to be more and more exacting. 
For awhile only a single glass had been taken with 
his dinner. Then there was an occasional second 
glass, and in time two glasses became the regular 
custom. A third glass now and then marked the 
steady growth of appetite. So it went on, with a 
slow but sure increase, until it was no unusual thing 
for Granger to drink half a bottle of wine every 
day with his dinner ; and to finish the bottle before 
going to bed. 

Fame and fortune were just within his reach. 
He was regarded as the ablest of all the rising men 
at the bar of his native city, and many of the best 
cases were coming into his hands, when the evidences 
of blight and failure of power became visible. After 
losing the case to which I have referred, he was on 
guard for a long time ; but the steadily increasing 
use of stimulants wrought its natural result on his 


AS BY FIRE. 


19 


brain, and his second great failure in court was due 
in all probability as much to a complete abstinence 
from drink as the first was to its use and the 
unhealthy excitement that followed. 

This loss of mental clearness in consequence of a 
loss of the usual brain-tonic, was a fact far more 
patent to Granger’s mind than had been the 
other fact of loss of mental clearness through un- 
usual stimulation, and he resolved not to risk 
another experiment of the kind, but rather to give 
his nerves a firmer tone by an extra glass on the 
eve of every specially important efibrt in court. It 
is surprising how men who are clear-seeing as to 
cause and effect in almost everything else, can be so 
blind about the ultimate result of repeated and in- 
creasing stimulation on that wonderful and delicate 
organism, the brain. It shows how snbtle, and 
strong, and self-deceiving is the sensual side of our 
nature, if, instead of holding it in strict subordina- 
tion to reason and the laws of order, we give it the 
rein, and submit even partially to its rule. 

After this second important failure, and Granger’s 
clear apprehension of the proximate cause, he did 
not again venture on complete abstinence as a safe 
preparation for entrance upon a legal conflict in 
which large interests hung on victory or defeat. 
But, for all this, he was never able to bring to his 
cases the clear logic and force of argument for 
which he had once been distinguished. He had, in 
fact, reached his highest point of success and repu- 


20 


SAVED 


tation ; and as the causes which had checked hia 
upward movement were still in force, and his power 
of resistance waning, it was not long before the 
downward change became apparent to all. 

And now, his nearest friends began to warn and 
to expostulate. But only after some disgraceful fall 
from sobriety, was heed taken, and efforts at reform 
made. It was the old story, as we have said. Fall- 
ing, falling slowly. Then a pause and a rallying of 
strength, and an effort to move upwards again. And 
then a yielding to the downward drag. He did not 
at this time show himself to the world as a common 
drunkard; and the people who met him on the 
street, at his office, or in the court-rooms, rarely 
saw him so much under the influence of liquor as 
to betray the fact in any marked way ; and yet, all 
could see that he was becoming the slave of drink, 
and that his utter ruin was only a matter of time, 
unless there should come a total change in his 
habits. 

Down, down, the descent becoming more rapid. 
Sudden stoppages, as one strong influence after 
another was brought to bear upon him; solemn 
promises, and pledges of reform ; Arm standing for 
brief periods ; and then, down, down again ! And 
thus it went on for years ; and there came loss of 
an honorable position at the bar ; loss of practice ; 
loss of social status ; moral weakness and degrada- 
tion ; poverty and wretchedness. And still, there 
were intermitted struggles with the enemy, and 


AS BY FIRE. 


21 


efforts to rise into a true manhood. A sad, sad 
history, running through years of increasing, dis- 
aster, humiliation and sorrow, until he had reached 
the level on which the reader finds him. 

Yet, as has been seen, some hope and strength 
were yet, remaining; some feeling of self-respect, 
and an unextinguished love for his unhappy wife 
and wronged and suffering children, for whom he 
would have braved any physical peril — even death 
itself. 



CHAPTER II. 


BREAKING OFF. 



HAVE taken a dozen pledges,” said Granger, 


-L as we passed into the street ; “ but they are as 
flax to fire when this thirst seizes upon me.” 

“ Because,” I answered, “ they are only external 
bonds ; and if the inner force be against them, they 
will break should the force be stronger than the 
bond. There is safety only in the strength of an 
internal integrity. The will must be strong and 
true. If, to change the figure of speech, the will be 
set to guard the door, no enemy can make a breach 
unless the will be corrupted. So long as the will is 
true, the man is safe. No, no. Put no trust in 
pledges nor promises. They are things outside of 
you, so to speak. Mere bonds, weak or strong, as 
the case may be. You must trust in yourself — in 
the strength of your will — in your manhood and 
self-centered power. Here is your only true abiding. 
The pledge may be well enough as a rallying point 
where a first stand is made against the enemy ; but 
the man must fight it out to the bitter end, and that 
in himself and by himself. There is no other hope. 
No arm but his own can save him.” 

We walked in silence for almost the distance of 


22 


AS BY FIRE. 23 

a block before Granger made any reply. He was, 
evidently, pondering what I had said, 

“ No arm but his own arm ?” He stopped, and 
turning, fixed his eyes steadily on my face, with a 
look in them that I scarcely comprehended. 

“ If a man fight not for himself, who shall fight 
for him ? This enemy is within, and the man him- 
self must cast him out. I cannot fight the battle for 
you ; nor can any one else. It is your own strong 
right arm that must bring the victory.” 

“ Is there no help in God ?” There was an eager 
thrill in his voice as he put the question. 

“ Of course,” I replied, a little coldly. “ But we 
must be careful not to confound things. A false, 
or irrational trust, is worse than no trust at all, for 
it will surely betray. God helps those who help 
themselves ; who use in right and orderly ways the 
strength He gives to every man. I know of no 
means by which to get help from God but in the 
right use of the faculties with which He has endowed 
us. They are, of course, God-given, for He is our 
Maker. But He does not live for us, nor work for 
us, nor fight , for us. All these we must do for our- 
selves.” 

I saw the light go slowly out of his face as he 
dropped his eyes to the ground, and moved forward 
again. Something like a shadow and a chill came 
upon my own feelings, and my mind seemed to pass 
into an obscuring cloud. Had I spoken truly ? Was 
there no other help in God but this that I had said ? 


24 


SAVED 


It was all very clear to me while I was sj^eaking ; 
but, somehow, my strong assurance was all at once 
broken, and I felt as one drifting to sea. I had 
been laying out this man’s course for him, and now 
I was in doubt myself. 

“ You may he right about it, Mr. Lyon,” Granger 
said, after another long silence. “ But it seems to 
put God so far away. To take from Him all pity, 
and tenderness, and love. He will heljj me if I try 
to help myself ; but, unless I do this. He will not so 
much as reach out His hand, though the billows he 
going over me !” 

Even above the noise of the street I heard the 
sigh that came with the closing of this last ^ntence. 

“ Is not His hand always reached out ?” I an- 
swered ; “ and is it not because we refuse to take 
hold of it that we are not saved ?” 

“ I don’t know.” He spoke in a dreary, depressed 
tone of voice. “ If one could see the hand, and he 
sure it was God’s.” 

“ What is the hand of God hut the power that is 
within us from Him ? The power to will and to do 
what is right ; to stand fast in the front of tempta- 
tion ; to walk securely in the strength He gives us ? 
We grasp His hand when we use this power.” 

“ Doubtless it is so ; hut our poor eyes have be- 
come very dim-sighted.” 

He was silent again, and I began to feel troubled 
about his state of mind, lest a depressing sense of 
weakness should destroy that confidence in his own 


AS BY FIRE. 25 

strength of will with which I was seeking to inspire 
him, 

“"We may be very sure of one thing, Mr. Gran- 
ger,” I said, repeating my former proposition, 
“ the true order of life is the government of reason. 
This must rule over all the lower things of sense. 
The appetites and passions must be held in complete 
subjection. God is with us, and in us ; gives us of 
His strength, and keeps us in safety, so long as we 
maintain this true order of life. If we will not 
maintain it, He cannot do it for us ; and the same 
law must rule in restoration and cure as in normal 
order. We must take the strength God is always 
giving, and use it for ourselves. We would be only 
machines if He merely lived in us as the mainspring 
of all our actions.” 

“No help, no love; only laws of order, No 
pitying face, nor tender voice, nor bending form. 
No quick, grasping hand as we send out the de- 
spairing cry, ‘ Save, Lord, or we perish !’ ” 

“Don’t let us talk any more about this, Mr, 
Granger,” said I, “It is troubling you and con- 
fusing your mind ; and now, above all things, you 
need to be calm and clear-seeing, for it is clear-see- 
ing that makes safe walking.” 

We were not far from his home now, and in a 
few minutes were at the door. What a poor little 
home it was as compared with that luxurious one in 
which I had many times been a guest in former 
years. Little better than that of an humble day- 


26 


SAVED 


laborer. I felt a chill and a heart-ache as my eyes 
looked upon it, and I remembered the beautiful 
home in which Mrs. Granger had once presided. 
She was a woman of more than ordinary culture and 
refinement. In stature below the common height, 
with regular though not strikingly handsome fea- 
tures. Her eyes made the fine attraction of her 
face ; they were large, . and, in color, of a dark 
hazel, with a perpetual changing of aspect and 
a restlessness of movement that was very peculiar. 
But you saw, in all these changing hues and as- 
pects, that they were true eyes, and beautiful as 
true. 

Granger took a latch-key from his pocket as we 
paused at the door. 

“Shall I go in?” I asked. “It might not be 
pleasant for Mrs. Granger.” 

He did not answer, but threw the door open, and 
made a motion for me to enter. There was a narrow 
hall, covered with a worn and faded carpet. From 
this we passed into a small parlor, in which were a 
few articles of furniture, remnants of better days. 
There were no pictures on the walls beyond a few 
photographic likenesses and two fine miniatures of 
Mr. and Mrs. Granger. Once they possessed many 
rare paintings. Plain Holland shades hung at the 
windows. Though everything was in order, there 
was a certain chill and desolateness in the atmosphere 
of the room that struck me sensibly. It might have 
come from the contrast I saw between this and the 


AS BY FIRE. 27 

large and luxurious parlor in which I had last met 
this unhappy family. 

But I had scarcely time to notice my surround- 
ings, or to question my state of feeling, before quick 
feet were heard on the stairs, and in a moment after- 
wards Mrs. Granger stood at the parlof door with 
wide-open, eager, questioning eyes ; now fixing them 
upon me, and now upon her husband. 

“Mr. Lyon; you remember him.” 

I reached out my hand as her husband gave my 
name. A faint tinge of color rose to her pale face. 
Ah, how changed and wasted ! 

She did not repeat my name, and I was not cer- 
tain that she recognized me. For a moment only 
did her eyes rest on me ; then they went swiftly to 
her husband, I saw a throb in her throat, and a 
flush and thrill quickening on her face, 

“There is going to be a new order of life, Mrs. 
Granger,” said I, breaking the silence and panto- 
mime. “And the old days are coming back 
again,” 

“A new life, Helen ! Yes, a new hfe, God help- 
ing me ! And the old better days again,” 

I saw the lips .that had been closely shut, fall 
apart, and the large eyes grow larger. There was a 
statue-like stillness ; then a faint, smothered cry, and 
a dropping down of the quivering face on Granger’s 
breast. My eyes were dim with sudden tears, hut I 
could see the husband’s arms fold themselves closely 
about the small, light form of that true, patient. 


28 


SAVED 


long-suffering one in whose heart love had never 
failed. 

I would have gone out and left them so, but that 
might not be well ; so I waited for this first strong 
tide of feeling to ebb. They were still standing — 
Mrs. Granger’s face hidden on her husband’s breast, 
and his" arms clasping her tightly — when the sound 
of other feet on the stairs was heard, and in a mo- 
ment after a beautiful girl stood, with startled eyes, 
at the door of the little parlor. , 

“Oh, it’s father !” she ejaculated. Then on seeing 
me, she shrunk back a step or two, with a timid air, 
the blood rising to her temples. 

“ Is anything the matter ?” she asked, in a panting 
voice, as a scared expression came into her face. 

“Yes, something good,” I answered, quickly. 

On hearing this. Granger withdrew one of his 
arms from about his wife, and holding it out toward 
the girl, said : “ My daughter !” 

Gliding past me with a rapid motion, she threw 
herself within the extended arm, and mother and 
child lay held in a single strong embrace. 

So I left them, passing out with noiseless feet. 
For stranger eyes all this was too sacred; and I felt 
that it was best for them to he alone. 

Next day I called at Mr. Granger’s office, and 
found him at his desk, busy over some law papers. 
Things about him had a look of new-made order, as 
if there had been a recent general setting to rights; 
and something in his personal appearance gave the 


A8 BY FIRE. 


29 


same impression. There was a bright flash in his 
eyes as he lifted them in recognition, and I saw a 
marvelous change in his face ; and, indeed, in his 
whole aspect. 

“All right,” I said, cheerily, as I grasped his ex- 
tended hand. 

“All right, thank God!” 

“And right once for all,” said I, in a confident 
tone. 

“ Yes ; once for all. Somehow,” he added, “ I 
feel stronger than I have ever felt before ; more self- 
centered, and with a firmer grasp on the rein. The 
fact is, Lyon, you gave me a new thought yesterday, 
and I’ve been looking at it and holding fast to it 
ever since ; and the more I look at it, and the longer 
I keep hold of it, the more assured do I feel. I see, 
as I never saw before, where the danger lies. It is 
the weak will that betrays.” 

“ Always,” I made answer. “ If the will he true 
and strong, the man is safe. Appetite can do noth- 
ing if the will be firm in denial. Never forget this. 
In the hour of temptation, it is the ‘ I will,’ or the 
‘I will not,’ that determines everything. There is 
not a devil in hell subtle enough to betray a man if 
he meet him with the all powerful ‘ I will not I’ ” 

‘T believe you, my friend.” 

There was, I did not fail to notice, more confi- 
dence in Granger’s words than in his voice; and 
this gave me a slight feeling of uneasiness. 

“ Hold on, as with hooks of steel, to your faith in 


30 


SAVED 


yourself — in the strength of your God-given man- 
hood, If the tempter comes, say ‘ No !’ as you will 
always he able to say. It is the weak, the doubting, 
the half-hearted who fall.” 

As we talked, a gentleman named Stannard came 
in. On seeing the change in Granger’s appearance, 
he said: “Been turning over another new leaf, 
I see. Glad of it from my heart. And now, 
friend Granger, what is to be the first writing 
thereon ?” 

“ I will not,” was the firmly spoken answer. 

“ Good as far as it goes,” 

“ What more ?” asked Granger. 

“ God being my helper.” 

“ Is not God’s strength in every true ‘ I will ’ or 
‘ I will not ?” said I, speaking before Granger had 
time to answer, for I was afraid of some confusion 
being wrought in his mind. 

“ There is no good thing that does not come from 
God,” was the calmly-spoken answer. “ In Him 
we live, and move, and have our being.” 

“No reflecting man will deny that. But the 
grave and practical question is, how does God be- 
stow His good things ? What are the laws of order 
by which He acts with men ?” 

“ Love is His great law,” said Mr. Stannard, 

“We all believe that; but love works through 
orderly means. If a man wilfully close his eyes, 
God cannot make him see. If he shut himself away 
in a dungeon, God cannot give him light. If he 


AS BY FIRE. 31 

‘ will not/ God cannot save him, though all day He 
stretches forth His merciful hand.” 

“No one will question that, I presume,” was an- 
swered. “ But now we have the other proposition 
under consideration. It is the ‘ I will not’ of our 
friend here as set against temptation. Now, under 
what law is he to get God’s help ?” 

“ It will come to him in his effort to do right.” 

“ ‘Ask and it shall be given unto you. Seek and 
ye shall find. Watch and pray, lest ye enter into 
temptation. Come unto me.’ These are the Lord’s 
own words ; and do they not mean that we are to 
do something more than what your answer indi- 
cates. Will all the help needed come without the 
asking ?” 

“As if,” I said, with a slight tremor of feeling in 
my voice, “ as if God held back for man’s formal 
asking ? As if His infinite love were not forever 
yearning to save ? and forever flowing with divine 
strength into every effort to fight against evil. It is 
in man’s will where he is truly potential ; and he 
must set his will against allurement, and stand in 
the strength of his true manhood.” 

“ But suppose the will has become so sickly and 
depraved that it cannot receive a just measure of life 
and strength from God ? When an organ in the 
human body is diseased it is no longer able to do its 
proper work, though the heart be perpetually send- 
ing for its use a due portion of healthy blood. If 
the will were in order, we might trust to the will ; 

3 


•32 


SAVED 


but, alas! it is not. It is diseased; and without 
help from the Great Physician, will fail in the work 
of its office. Nay, nay, friend Granger, put no 
faith in your ‘I will not,’ unless you write also on 
the leaf of the new page you have turned, ^God 
being my helper.’ If this be not done all your good 
purposes will avail, I fear, but little.” 

“Anything to give our friend strength,” I re- 
plied. “ It will do no harm for him to write as you 
say ; only let him not lose faith in himself because 
of his trust in God. It is just here that the danger 
lies. It is the clear-seeing, as I have said to him, 
that makes the safe-walking. If we do not know 
the way, we are all the while in danger of stum- 
bling.” 

“ ‘ I am the way, and the truth, and the life,’ ” said 
Mr. Stannard. “ If we go to Him, shall we be in 
any danger of losing our way ? I think not.” 

As we talked. Granger looked first at one of us 
and then at the other, hearkening carefully to what 
we said, and evidently weighing the import of our 
words. That all was not clear to him, was evident 
from his manner. I dropped the argument, in fear 
that his mind might get confused, and that, while in 
this unsettled state, his old enemy might rush in 
upon him and bear him down ere he had time to 
arrange his order of defence. 

Mr. Stannard had called on a matter of business, 
and on becoming aware of this, I withdrew from the 
office and left him alone with Granger. I carried 


AS BY FIRE. 


33 


away with me an uneasy feeling. Mr. Stannard 
was a man for whom I had great respect. He was 
a prominent church member, and active in Christian 
work ; and so far as my knowledge of him went, his 
life among men was blameless. But my philosophy 
of religion differed in some essential points from his. 
We both held to the necessity of a pure life ; hut 
were not in agreement as to the means whereby this 
purity of life was to he attained. He held to the 
power of grace, through faith, as the only means 
whereby man could he saved — at least, so I had 
understood him — I to man’s innate force of will, 
into which strength would flow from God the in- 
stant his will moved in a right effort. My fear now 
was, that Mr. Stannard might undo the work I had 
attempted, and destroy Granger’s faith in himself, 
leaving him to a blind confidence in some outside 
help which might never come. This was the 
ground of my uneasiness. 

I did not see Granger again for several days ; and 
then our meeting was in a public thoroughfare, and 
for a few moments only. His face was clear and 
bright, and his air manly and assured. 

“ All right !” I said, as I took his hand. 

“All right,” he responded, giving me a strong 
returning grip. 

“ Standing fast by ‘ I will not.’ ” 

“ Standing fast,” was his answer, a slight change 
in the expression of his countenance. 

It was on my lips to say : “ Don’t forget that the 


34 


SAVED 


will is the man; and that all hell cannot move 
him if the will stand fast.” But I held the sen- 
tence hack from an impulse I did not quite under- 
stand. So we parted, each going his way. 



CHAPTER III. 


AGONY AT HOME. 


“ /TRS. GRANGER was in church this morn- 
-LV-L ing,” said my wife, on coming home, a few 
Sundays afterward. 

“ Ah ! How did she look ?” 

“ The sight of her brought tears into my eyes. 
How much she has changed. And she looked so 
poor and humbled.” 

“ Was any one with her?” 

I did not put the question that was in my thought; 
but the one I asked would bring, I doubted not, the 
answer I wished to hear. 

“ Yes ; a sweet young girl — her oldest daughter, 
Amy, I presume. The beautiful child has grown 
almost to a woman since I saw her last.” 

“No one else?” 

“No.” 


Though I had not been to church myself, and had 
not much faith in Sunday religious services, judg- 
ing of them by their influence on a majority of my 
church-going acquaintances, I could not help feeling 
regret at the fact of Mr. Granger’s absence. Some- 
how, the impression took hold of me that it would 
have been better and safer for him to have gone to 
35 


36 


SAVED 


church ; and the fact that he had not accompanied 
his wife left on my mind a vague sense of uneasi- 
ness. Where had he gone ; and what were the in- 
fluences which had been around him on this day of 
freedom from daily work and the thought and care 
of business ? 

“ Mr. Granger was not there,” said I, wishing to 
be altogether sure about the matter. 

“No.” Then, after a little silence, Mrs'. Lyon 
said, “ I was sorry not to have seen him with his 
wife.” 

It was on my tongue to express the regret I was 
myself feeling, but as my wife and I were not wholly 
in agreement on the subject of church-going, I did 
not care to commit myself so far as to give an assent 
to her view of the case ; and as I did not respond, 
the subject was dropped. 

After dinner I took a walk, and as I could not 
get Granger out of my mind, nor rid myself of a 
certain feeling of responsibility in regard to him, I 
concluded to extend my ramble as far as the neigh- 
borhood in which he lived and make him a call. 
My ring brought his wife to the door. 

“ Is Mr. Granger at home ?” I asked. 

I saw a slight shade drop across her face as she 
answered : “ No ; he has gone to take a walk in the 
Park.” Then, after a moment, “ Won’t you come 
in, Mr. Lyon ?” 

I accepted the invitation. As I took a seat in the 
plain little parlor, and looked at Mrs. Granger, I 


AS BY FIRE. 


37 


was painfully impressed, with the changes a few 
years had wrought in her appearance. Such lines 
of suffering as had been cut into her brow and 
around her lips! Such wasting and exhaustion! 
It was very sad. 

“I met your husband a few days ago,” said I, 
speaking at once, so that there might be no embar- 
rassing pause, “ and was glad to see him looking so 
well.” • • 

She smiled faintly ; but not with the bright, al- 
most radiant smile I was hoping to see. 

“ Yes ; he is doing very well.” Her voice lacked 
heartiness, I fancied. 

“ And is going to stand this time,” said I, speak- 
ing confidently. 

“ God grant it !” A reverent earnestness coming 
into her manner, 

“ He has found a new element of strength.” 

She met my remark with a look of inquiry, keen 
and searching. 

“A true faith in himself — in his manhood — in 
the native force of his own strong will.” 

“ There is no sure help but in God, Mr. Lyon.” 

I seem to hear now her slow utterance of this 
sentiment, and the strong emphasis given to the 
words, “Ah sure help but in God” 

“ God is in every manly eflfort to do right,” I an- 
swered. “He gives strength to the will that sets 
itself against evil enticement. We trust in Him 
when we trust in the power He gives us.” 


38 


SAVED 


“ What my husband says ; and it may all be so 
in some way that I do not clearly understand.” 

I made an effort to explain myself more clearly ; 
hut, when I was done, she answered with simple 
earnestness : “ It is better to look to God than to 
ourselves, Mr. Lyon. I am sure of that. Every 
hour, every moment, even, we need His help and 
care, for the enemies who are against us are very 
malignant, very subtle, and very strong. I should 
have a safer feeling about my husband if he had a 
little less confidence in the strength of his own will, 
and more in that Divine power which I believe can 
only he had for the asking.” 

“ As if God would stand away, coldly indifferent, 
and let a striving soul perish because there was no 
formal asking. Such a thought, in my view, dis- 
honors Him. Would a father wait for his child to 
call for help if he saw him drowning ?” 

“ No ; and I do not think that God ever holds 
back from saving in the sense you seem to mean, 
Mr. Lyon. If a father were reaching after his 
drowning child, and calling to him, ‘ Give me your 
hand, my son !’ and his child were to refuse the of- 
fered help, and trust to his own strength, how could 
the father save him ?” 

She waited for my reply, looking at me steadily. 
What answer could I make ? The question seemed 
to open a window in my soul and let in beams of 
light ; hut they were not yet strong enough to make 
her full meaning clear. 


AS BY FIRE. 


39 


“ Well, what more ?” I queried. 

“ Our Heavenly Father is all the while reaching 
out to save His perishing children, and His voice, 
tender with compassion, and earnest with love, is 
forever crying, ‘ Son, give me thy heart !’ And if 
the heart be not given, how can the soul be saved ?” 

Mrs. Granger’s further question almost startled 
me. It gave a deeper significance to “ being saved ” 
than I had yet comprehended. 

She went on : “They that dwell in God dwell in 
safety. Of that we may be sure. Can this be said, 
confidently, of any others? Ah! sir, where so 
much is at stake it will not do to risk anything in 
doubtful trusts. A man’s, will may be very strong ; 
but if the Spirit of God be within him, he will be 
far stronger — nay, invincible in the face of legions 
of enemies. God is as a walled city about his peo- 
ple, and as a rock of defence. He is a sure refuge 
in the day of trouble.” 

Her face had kindled, and there was something 
in the earnestness of her manner, and in the assured 
tones with which she spoke, that seemed to bear me 
away and set me adrift. I had nothing to say in 
opposition. What could I say ? There was truth 
in every word she had uttered ; and if I had ques- 
tioned or cavilled in anything, it would only have 
been as to the exact meaning and practical application 
of the truths she had spoken. And after all, might 
she not have a clearer insight than myself into the 
mystery of God’s ways with man ? 


40 


SAVED 


“You must try to get Mr. Granger to go to 
church with you. It will be best for him, I am 
sure,” said I, speaking with a stronger conviction of 
the truth of what I said than I was willing to admit 
even to myself. 

“If you would only urge him to go, Mr. Lyon. 
He has great confidence in your judgment, and will 
he influenced by what you say. You have helped 
him greatly ; helped not only to lift him to his feet 
again, hut to set them going in the right way. Only, 
Mr. Lyon — and you will excuse me for saying it — 
you are leading him, I greatly fear, into a state of 
felse security. We may differ about this. But, sir, 
the safest way is the best way ; and I am sure that 
he who goes to God under a sense of weakness, and 
prays for strength, will be stronger in the hour of 
temptation, and safer under the assaults of his 
enemies, than he who relies solely upon himself.” 

“Not solely upon himself,” I returned. “I did 
not mean that he should so understand me. We 
have no life that is absolutely our own ; and no 
strength that is absolutely our own; all are from 
God. Still, the life and strength that God is per- 
petually giving we must take and use as if it were 
our own. I meant no more and no less. God gives 
the strength to fight ; but we must overcome. He 
does not work for us, nor fight for us, nor save us ; 
for doing so would be to destroy what makes our 
very life. We must do all this for ourselves ; using 
the power He is forever giving to all who will use it.” 


AS BY FIRE. 


41 


“And especially to all who call upon Him in 
truth,” said Mrs. Granger. “ It may he very clear 
to you, sir,” she added, “ how one may stand fast in 
the strength God is always giving. But, if I read 
my Bible aright there is a sphere of safety higher 
and surer than this — a more absolute getting, as it 
were, into the everlasting arms ; and I shall never 
feel at ease in regard to my husband until I feel 
sure that these everlasting arms are round about 
him.” 

I left the house more thoughtful and serious than 
when I went in, and took my way to the Park, 
hoping that I might meet Mr. Granger ; for, some- 
how, his wife’s sense of insecurity in regard to him 
had left a like impression on my own mind. The 
afternoon was clear and bright, and many thousands 
of people were in the Park, walking, driving and 
recruiting themselves in many ways ; some, I regret 
to say, making too free use of the restaurants at 
which, in defiance of Sunday laws, but under license 
from the Park Commissioners, some of them church- 
going men, all kinds of intoxicating drinks were 
dispensed to the people. 

I was sitting on the lawn near the largest of these 
restaurants, from which could be seen the beautiful 
river, placid as a lake, and the city with its spires 
and domes in the distance, when I saw Granger in 
company with two men, one of whom I recognized 
as a lawyer of some standing at the bar, and the 
other as a respectable merchant. They were cross- 


42 


SAVED 


ing the lawn at the distance of twenty or thirty 
yards from where I was sitting, and going in the 
direction of one of the small refreshment tables that 
stood in front of the restaurant. On reaching this 
table, they all sat down and one of them beckoned to 
a waiter, who, on recemng his order, went away. 
In a little while he returned with two glasses of 
some kind of mixed liquor and a bottle of soda wa- 
ter. My relief was great when I saw this, for I 
naturally inferred that the soda water was for Gran- 
ger; and in this I was right. When they had 
finished their glasses, one of them took from his 
pocket a segar-case, and after each had lighted a 
segar and smoked for a little while, they got up and 
went leisurely strolling down one of the avenues, 
taking a homeward direction. 

Two or three times I had been on the point of 
joining them, but the fear lest it should prove to 
Granger an embarrassing intrusion, restrained me 
from doing so. I was troubled at the occurrence. 
This was going into danger ; taking unguarded rest 
on the enemy’s ground; inviting temptation. It 
was scarcely possible, I saw, for Granger to sit 
drinking with his friends, though he took only soda 
water himself, without the odor of their glasses drift- 
ing to his nostrils with its enticing allurement for 
his denied appetite. Nor could he do so, without a 
mental contrast of their freedom with his restraint. 
In any view of the incident that I could take, it 
gave me only regret and concern ; and I felt grieved 


AS BY FIRE. 


43 


almost to anger with the two friends who, knowing 
as they did the man’s weakness, and the great deep 
out of which he had just struggled, should so set 
temptation in his way as to make his fall again not 
only possible, but imminent. 



CHAPTEE IV. 


ALL GONE. 

I DID not feel easy in my mind until I liad called 
at Granger’s office on the next day. I found 
him all right and busy at work. His eyes bright- 
ened as he saw me, and he said, with genuine heart- 
iness, as he grasped my hand : “ I was so sorry you 
called yesterday without finding me at home. Helen 
told me of your visit. I had gone out for a stroll 
in the Park.” 

While I was hesitating whether or not to say that 
I had seen him there, he added, with a shade 
of pride and self-confidence in his voice: “I had 
an opportunity to test the native strength that lies 
with every man, yesterday, and to prove the power 
of a resolute ‘I will not.’ ” 

“Ah ? What were the circumstances ?” I wished 
to get his own story, and so gave no intimation of 
what I had seen. 

He replied: “I met two friends while walking 
near Belmont, and they invited me to join them in 
a drink. My first thought was to say No ; but not 
wishing to be disagreeable, I said, ‘All right,’ and 
we went over to Proskauer’s. I had just a little 
fight with myself as we walked along ; but it was 
soon over, and will stood firmly on guard. ‘ What 



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AS BY FIRE. 


47 ’ 


will you take ?’ asked one of them, as we sat down 
in front of the restaurant. ‘ Claret punch,’ said the 
other. ‘ And you ?’ looking at me. Will was all 
right and on guard, as I have said, and ‘ Soda water 
for me,’ came without a shade of hesitation in my 
voice. I never felt in greater freedom nor more at 
ease and assured. Thank you from my heart, friend 
Lyon ; you have helped me to get the full mastery 
of myself.” 

“ If a man only will to overcome in the day of 
temptation, his victory is sure,” said I, with renewed 
confidence; for, was not the proof of this before 
me ? “I am glad for your victory,” I continued. 
“ It not only gives you increased assurance of safety, 
but makes clear to your mind wherein this safety 
lies. It is within ourselves that we must look for 
help and strength. God is always giving us the 
power to live right and to dwell beyond the reach of 
our enemies ; but He does not use that power for 
us. This we must do for ourselves.” 

“All as clear to me as the sun at noonday,” 
Granger replied. “ And how strong I feel in this 
.consciousness that if I will not, all hell, as you have 
said, cannot move me. To stand self-centered is to 
stand sure.” 

But for all his confidence and my own, I did not 
feel that Granger was wholly safe. If there had 
been no such thing as infirmity of the will, no sud- 
den assaults of the enemy in unguarded moments, 
no alluring enticements of the flesh, nor subtle 


48 


SAVED 


reasonings of the sensual principle, which is sc 
ready to say when forbidden fruit is at the lip, “Ye 
shall not surely die,” I might not have doubted. 
But I could not rule these considerations out of the 
question. They were ever existing sources of dan- 
ger and causes of anxiety ; and I knew but too well 
that the history of moral defection was the history 
of their dominion over the will of man. 

“ But, after all,” I could not help saying, “ is it 
not safest for us to keep as much as possible out of 
the way of temptation ?” 

“ Yes,” he answered, in a tone that was almost 
indifferent. “ Safest, of course, to be in a sheltered 
embrasure than out on the battle-field. But the 
skill to fight, and the power to resist assault, cannot 
be gained while one lies beyond the reach of danger. 
We must be brave and strong, and ever ready for 
the fight ; not so much seeking to avoid conflict, as 
to be armed and ready, and quick to strike when 
the foe appears. Does any man know his strength 
until it is tried ? Is any man really strong until he 
has met temptation and come out victorious ?” 

There are truths which become changed into fal- 
lacies because not considered in relation to other 
truths ; or because of their too limited or too general 
application. In the case of Granger, while I could 
not deny the abstract truth of what he had been 
saying, I felt that he stood in great danger of letting 
it he to him little more than a betraying fallacy. 

I saw him frequently after this, and observed him 


AS B Y FIRE. 


49 


closely. How fast the old strength, the old working 
force and the old ambition were returning. And 
with all, how strong he seemed to be in the new 
power which he had gained. 

“My ‘will not’ is my sword and shield,” he said 
to me, many weeks after his new life began. “ If 
my enemy assault me from a distance, I catch his 
arrows upon this shield ; if he fall upon me sud- 
denly, I defeat him with this sword.” 

Time passed, and still Granger’s feet were stand- 
ing on solid ground. Business came flowing in, and 
men who had important cases were again employing 
him as counsel. He did not keep out of the way of 
temptation as much as I thought prudent ; but his “ I 
will not” held him above the force of all allurement. 

At home, the new aspect of things was like the 
coming of spring after a long and desolate winter. 
The poor, little, ill-attired house was changed for 
one larger and more comfortable, and furnished in 
a style more befitting the tastes and habits of his 
wife and children. Old social relations were in 
many cases restored, and Mrs. Granger was seen 
now and then in public places with her husband. 
Heart-ache, deprivation, toil and humiliation had 
made sorrowful changes in her face, and shadowed 
her beautiful eyes ; but slowly the new spring-time 
which opened upon her life wrought its sweet 
changes, until you began to lose sight of the winter’s 
ravages, and to find in their stead the pleasant signs 
of a fast-coming and bountiful summer. 

4 


50 


SAVED 


For a whole year Granger held his ground, walk- 
ing safely amid temptations that assailed him on the 
right hand and on the left. His profession brought 
him into familiar association with men who not only 
used wine freely themselves, but made its offer to 
their friends a social courtesy. Still, his steady 
refusal to touch or taste was maintained. “ I will 
not” continued to be his tower of strength. 

“ I am prouder of this self-mastery,” he said to 
me one day, “ than of any achievement in my life. 
In the strength of this asserted manhood, I stand as 
a rock, unmoved, though the billows dash madly 
against me.” 

“ He that ruleth his own spirit is better than he 
that taketh a city,” I replied. “ The greatest of all 
heroes is the man who conquers himself.” 

“Say, rather, he who, single-handed, meets the 
infernal crew who would drag him down to death 
and hell, and beats them back,” he replied. 

There was a proud flash in his eyes as he lifted 
himself to a statelier bearing. 

“ Have you seen Mr. Granger recently ?” asked 
my wife, not many weeks afterwards. It was on 
Sunday, and we were sitting at the dinner-table. 

“No; why do you ask?” Something in Mrs. 
Lyon’s voice gave me a feeling of uneasiness. 

“I saw Mrs. Granger at church this morning, 
and she looked as if she had just come out of a sj)ell 
of sickness.” 

“Was she at church last Sunday?” 


AS BY FIRE. 


51 


“Yes.” 

“ Did you observe anything unusual in her ap- 
pearance then ?” 

“No.” 

“Was her daughter with her to-day ?” 

“Yes; and she looked almost as wretched as her 
mother. There’s something wrong, I’m afraid. Oh, 
if Mr. Granger should have taken to drinking again, 
would it not be dreadful ?” 

My knife and fork dropped from my hands, and 
I half rose from the table, so pained and startled 
was I by this suggestion. 

“ Oh, no, no, that cannot be !” I replied, as I made 
an efibrt to compose myself. “ Mr. Granger is too 
strong, and too well established in his reformation.” 

“From what I have heard you say,” returned my 
wife, “I have been inclined to think him too self- 
confident. The boastful are not always the farthest 
removed from peril; and Granger has shown a 
weakness in this direction. His ‘I will not,’ in 
which you and he have put so great faith, may have 
proven his stone of stumbling.” 

“Why do you say that?” I demanded, in a voice 
meant to be assured, but into which came a betrayal 
of weakness and fear. 

“A man,” replied my wife, “who has such a 
fast faith in his ‘ I will not,’ as Granger possesses, 
may fall through over-confidence in the power of 
self-mastery.” 

“How?” 


52 


SAVED 


“He may trust it too far.” 

“I do not get your meaning. What is it?” 

“ Your friend is offered a 'glass of wine. The 
sight and the odor kindle into a sudden flame the 
old desire. ,He is conscious of strength, and with 
an emphatic mental ‘ I will not !’ turns from the 
tempting glass. But, suppose, in his conscious, self- 
centered strength, as you call it, he should say, ‘ I 
will not taste hut a single glass,’ what then ? Is he 
not as sure of himself after a single glass as he was 
before ? Can he not say, ‘ So far and no farther ?’ ” 

“You know that he cannot,” I replied, almost 
sharply, for her suggestion had struck me like a 
blow. “ That single glass would not only break the 
strength of his will but give to appetite a new and 
stronger power.” 

“ But, suppose, in his self-confldence, he did not 
believe this? When we are well and strong we 
make light of over-strain, and the unseen but subtle 
influences of miasma. Don’t you see the perpetual 
danger in which he would stand ?” 

I did see it as I had not seen it before, though 
many times fears and misgivings had troubled me. 

“But about Mrs. Granger and her daughter?” I 
asked. “ How did they look ?” 

“ I only saw them for a moment or two in the 
vestibule of the church. At the first glance I 
scarcely recognized Mrs. Granger. There did not 
seem to be a particle of color in her face, which was 
pinched, as we see it in those who are suffering acute 


A8 BY FIRE. 


pain. She did not look up at any one, and had the 
manner of a person who wished to shrink away 
without attracting observation. Depend upon it, 
there is something wrong with her husband.” 

“Something wrong with her husband!” It had 
the sound of a knell in my ears. 

After dinner, I called at Granger’s residence and 
asked for him, but was informed by the servant that 
he was not at home. I then inquired for Mrs. 
Granger, who sent word that she was not feeling 
well, and asked to be excused. • The servant’s man- 
ner was repressed and mysterious. I went away 
with a heavy weight pressing on my heart, and 
taking a car rode out to the Park, thinking it pos- 
sible that I might find Granger there. _ I spent the 
whole afternoon in the neighborhood of Belmont, 
but saw nothing of him. In the evening, I called 
at his house again, but was told, as before, that he 
was not at home. There was a look in the servant’s 
face, as she made this answer, which led me to 
doubt its truth. 

I made it my business to go to the lawyer’s office 
as early as ten o’clock on the following day. He 
had not yet made his appearance. I returned at 
twelve ; but he was still absent. Then I visited the 
court-rooms and inquired for him there ; but no one 
remembered to have seen him within the last two or 
three days. Late in the afternoon, I again visited 
his office, but the door was still locked. 

On the next day, and on the next, my efforts to 


54 


SAVED 


find Granger were no more successful. He still re- 
mained away from his office. A week passed with- 
out my seeing him. I had again and again called 
at his residence, only to be informed that he was 
not at home. 

Sitting in my office late one afternoon, I heard 
the door open, and turning, saw this man for whom 
so great a concern was lying on my heart. Was it 
all a dream, then, this year of reform and restora- 
tion ? — a bright, but cheating dream ? As I had 
seen him, debased, nerveless, wretched, a year ago, 
so I saw him now. Eyes blood-shotten, — dress 
soiled and disordered, — face shorn of all manliness, 
and marked in every lineament with debauchery 
and excess ! 

“ Oh, Granger ! Granger !” I cried out, the sorrow 
and pain which I felt going into my voice. “ And 
has it come to this ? All your strength gone — all 
your manhood trodden into the mire ?” 

“ All gone,” he answered, in a moody, dogged 
kind of way, as he shut the door and came a step 
or two forward. I saw that he was considerably 
under the influence of drink. 

“ I had hoped better things of you than this, Mr. 
Granger,” said I, with a measure of rebuke in my 
voice. 

“ And I had hoped better things of myself,” he 
replied, as he sat down, or rather, dropped heavily 
into a chair. “But I rather guess we reasoned 
without our host, friend Lyon, — built on a sandy 


AS BY FIRE. 


55 


founaation ; and when the winds blew, and the rain 
fell, and the floods came, down went the house, and 
the fall thereof was great. Ha ! Isn’t it so ? Don’t 
you remember that talk we had with Mr. Stannard 
— about the new leaf I had turned, and the writing 
that was to go thereon. You and he differed about 
it, I remember ; and I took your view of the case. 
But, d’ you know, I’ve always had a notion that he 
was nearest right.” 

“ Then, in Heaven’s name, try his way !” I ex- 
claimed. “ Anything to save you from this dread- 
ful sin and debasement.” 

“ That is, go and join the church.” He gave a 
short, ironical laugh. “Nice subject for the church!” 
And he looked down at himself. “ But, see here, 
Lyon,” his manner changing, “ I’m all cleaned out. 
Look !” and he held his pocket-book open. “ All 
gone, you perceive. Had more than a hundred 
dollars when — when — I got on this confounded 
spree I Lend me a twenty. I want to buy a clean 
shirt, and get a bath, and flx myself up before going 
home.” 

“ Will you flx yourself up and go home ?” I 
asked. 

“ Of course I will. But I can’t meet Helen and 
the children looking like this. I’d rather go and 
jump into the river.” 

I hesitated, not feeling sure of him. He was 
under the influence of drink; and the word of a 
man in this condition can rarely, if ever, be trusted. 


56 


SAVED 


“ Honor bright, Mr. Lyon. I’m not going to de- 
ceive you. I’ve set my foot down, and don’t mean 
to drink another drop.” 

“ Here are ten dollars,” I said, taking a bank-bill 
from my pocket-book ; “ but before I give it to you, 
I must have your word, as a man of honor, that you 
will not spend a dollar of this money for liquor.” 

“ My word and my honor, Mr. Lyon,” and he 
placed his hand over his heart. 

In the next moment he was reaching out eagerly 
for the bank-bill, which I let him take, though not 
without many misgivings as to his proper use of the 
money. He rose immediately and made a move- 
ment to leave the office. 

“ Not yet, Mr, Granger. Sit down again. I wish 
to have a little more talk with you.” 

“ I’ll call in to-morrow,” he replied, not resuming 
his seat, and showing considerable eagerness to get 
away. “ Haven’t been home since day before yes- 
terday, and they’re getting worried about me. Good- 
afternoon !” 

And before I could make a movement to intercept 
him, he was gone. 



CHAPTEK V. 


ALMOST IN DESPAIR. 

I FOUND Granger at his office on the next day. 

He was writing, and did not turn to see who 
had come in until I had waited for some moments. 
His color heightened as he recognized me. There 
was a look of shame in his face, and considerable 
embarrassment in his manner. 

“ Good morning,” said I. 

“ Good morning,” he responded, in a dull, cold 
way. There was not the slightest invitation to 
friendly- confidence. I felt him pushing me off 
almost as distinctly as if his action had been phy- 
sical instead of mental. 

“Just looked in to see how you were,” I re- 
marked. “ All right, I hope ?” 

He turned a little from me, not making any 
reply. While I was still in doubt as to what it 
were best for me to do or say, a client came in to 
consult him on business, which gave me an oppor- 
tunity to retire from the office. I was glad of this, 
for I was not sure as to Granger’s real state of 
mind ; nor half so confident as I had been a year 
before that I could give the wise counsel a man in his 
condition so greatly needed. That he had faithfully 
57 


SA VED 


58 • 

tried the prescription which I gave him then, I 
knew ; and there was this to be said in its favor, 
by its help he had stood firm for a whole year — and 
was not that a great deal ? True, but why had he 
gained nothing in moral and spiritual power during 
all this rule of the will over his sensual nature? 
He should have been stronger, more self-centered, 
more really invincible at the end of a year than at 
the beginning ; and yet, the will off guard, in some 
moment of assault, and he was again in the hands 
of his enemy. 

One conclusion forced itself upon me. This man’s 
condition was worse than before he made his reso- 
lute and, for a time, successful effort to reform. The 
will-power, in which he had trusted so confidently, 
had failed in strength and vigilance, and left him a 
prey to inrushing appetite. Even if faith in him- 
self were not destroyed, it must be a weaker faith 
and less able to contend with appetite, which, 
through another victory, had gained a new force. 

All this, as I dwelt on the subject, grew clearer 
and clearer to my mind. I could see how a reso- 
lute will might hold a man above consent in any 
and every temptation by which he might be assailed ; 
and I could also see how, if the will betrayed the 
man, and he fell, he would be weaker for the fall, 
and more easily overcome in a new temptation. 
What then ? What hope for him ? There would 
be an inflowing of strength from God with every 
subsequent effort the man might make to get free 


A8 BY FIRE. 


'59 

from the dominion of evil ; but would not the re- 
ception of this strength and the ability to use it, be 
in a steadily diminishing ratio ; and would not the 
power of appetite increase with every indulgence ? 

My faith in man’s will had received a shock. 
There was an element of weakness somewhere. 
Why should God fail to give the requisite strength 
when the effort was sincere ? Did he indeed govern, 
as many taught, by mere arbitrary laws ; affording 
help to the weak and perishing only in the degree 
of their compliance with certain ’ legal conditions ? 
Or, were the conditions not arbitrary but essential and 
in the very nature of things ? If God be good and 
wise — loving and compassionate — ever seeking to 
save to the very uttermost, must not this be so? 
God is love — love. Heart and soul held to this. 
But, how was the sustaining strength of this love to 
make itself a living force in man ? How? I could 
not see it clearly. Once it had been very clear; 
but my thoughts were in confusion now. 

I had reached the door of my own office, and was 
about entering, when a sudden movement in the 
street attracted my attention. People were running 
together, in an excited manner. 

“ Only a drunken row,” said a man who was 
standing near me. 

“ That all.” And I passed into my office. 

Only a drunken row ! I had dismissed the inci- 
dent as of little account when I was startled by the 
sound of tramping feet and dissonant voices at my 


60 


SAVED 


very door ; and in a moment after, three men en- 
tered bearing the body of a man, deathly pale, and 
with the blood streaming from a wound in his head. 
I recognized him as a well-known and prominent 
citizen. 

A doctor was sent for, and after the wound was 
dressed, the gentleman was removed to his own 
home. 

Only a drunken row ! An effort was made to 
keep the affair out of the newspapers, but not with 
entire success. In one afternoon sheet this account 
appeared : 

“Assault on a Prominent Citizen. — A das- 
tardly assault was made this morning on our es- 
teemed fellow citizen, Harvey Leonard, Esq., by a 
ruffianly fellow named Groot. It occurred just in 
front of Egbert’s saloon. Mr. Leonard had just left 
the saloon, when Groot dealt him a severe blow 
from behind, knocking him down. In falling, his 
head struck the curbstone, and he received an ugly 
wound above the temple. Mr. Leonard was carried 
into Frederick Lyon’s office, where the wound was 
dressed by Dr. Gerhard. He was then taken to his 
Own home. We learn that the immediate occasion 
of this assault was a political argument into which 
Mr. Leonard permitted himself to be drawn by 
Groot, and in which both of them — they had been 
drinking rather freely, we are sorry to say — got 
angry and called hard names. Mr. Leonard had 
the best of the argument, and Groot revenged him- 


AS BY FIRE. 


61 


self, after the ruffianly fashion, by knocking him 
down. He may thank his stars if he doesn’t have 
to stand a trial for manslaughter ; for no one can 
tell what may he the result of a severe concussion 
of the brain. When removed to his home, we under- 
stand that Mr. Leonard was in a half-cometose state.” 

I had just read this account of the affair, and was 
thinking of the mortification Mr. Leonard’s family 
must suffer should it happen to meet their eyes — 
there were grown-up sons and daughters — ^when, to 
my surprise, Mr. Granger entered my office. He 
smiled faintly as he came in, the smile dying off 
slowly, and leaving his face very grave. 

“ I want to have another talk with you, Lyon,” 
he said. This is a shocking affair of Leonard’s, 
isn’t it ?” 

“ Shocking and sad,” I replied. 

“I know this Groot. He’s peaceable enough 
when sober, but a devil incarnate when drunk. They 
say that Leonard is in a dangerous condition.” 

“ So the Telegraph intimates.” 

“ I don’t know when anything has given me such 
a shock. It might have happened to me as well as 
to Leonard. Why, only a few evenings ago I had 
some sharp words wdth the fellow. I can remem- 
ber the glitter of his angry eyes. He would have 
struck me down if he had dared. Liquor makes 
fiends of some men who are as quiet and peaceable 
as lambs when sober. I’ve often thought of that. 
Can you explain it, Mr. Lyon ?” 


62 


SAVED 


“ I have no settled theory of my own on the sub- 
ject ; hut in a book which I read not long ago, I saw 
an explanation that set me to thinking.” 

“ What was it ?” 

“ The writer had been speaking of the terrible 
transformations wrought in men by drink. How 
the once tender and considerate husband became 
changed often into a cruel fiend. How the loving 
father grew indifferent or brutal towards his children; 
the good citizen a social pest; and the esteemed 
neighbor an offence. How in everything the order 
of life was changed ; the goodly tree that once gave 
such generous fruit becoming as a thorn or bramble. 
He then said : 

“‘We marvel at these awful transformations, won- 
dering how inebriation can change men into fiends ; 
how alcohol, a mere substance in nature, and with- 
out moral force, can, through its action on the brain, 
evolve a new moral quality— intense, destructive 
and infernal. The fact no one questions, for it 
stands all the while confronting and challenging us 
in a thousand terrible and disgusting forrus ; and 
yet, for all this, men dally with the subtle agent of 
hell, giving it a lodgment in body and brain, and 
suffering it to gain a large and still larger action 
among the vital forces, which it never touches but 
to work disorder. They see how it hurts their 
neighbors; but, strangely enough, do not fear for 
themselves. 

“ ‘ There is a truth about this matter which few 


AS BY FIRE. 


63 


consider — a truth that, if well understood, would 
hold thousands upon thousands away from that so- 
called moderate indulgence in alcohol which so 
often betrays to utter ruin. We speak of man as 
having rational freedom. The seat of this freedom 
and rationality is the brain, the physical organism 
through which it acts and influences the outer life. 
If the brain is hurt or disturbed, the mind’s healthy 
action is at once lost ; and it is remarkable that an 
evil force seems to get possession of the will as soon 
as the rational equipoise is lost. 

“ ‘ Whatever disturbs a man’s rational equipoise, 
gives evil forces a power over him which could not 
otherwise be obtained. Clearly, then, to disturb the 
brain’s healthy action by the introduction of alco- 
hol, through the blood, into that wonderfully deli- 
cate organ, is for a man to change so far the true 
heavenly order of his life, and to open the door for 
an influx of disorder and evil. The change may at 
first be very small, and the disorderly action scarcely 
perceived ; but is it not clear to the dullest mind 
that, if the introduction of alcohol into the brain be 
continued day after day, and with gradual increase, 
the time must come when the man’s rational control 
of himself will be lost? And when this takes 
place, he becomes subject to infernal influences.’ ” 

“This goes deeper than I had thought,” said 
Granger, as I stopped speaking, “ and involves more 
than I can now understand or admit. So much is 
true, at least, that when the brain is disturbed by 


64 


SAVED 


drink, a man comes under baleful influences, and is 
far more inclined to evil than to good. He is quick 
to take offence, and too offer grows passionate, cruel 
and pitiless, hurting even his best beloved. Ah, 
what a cursed slavery it is I” 

A painful agitation disturbed his face. 

“ And the hardest to break of any into which a 
poor mortal can unhappily fall,” I said. 

“ Is there any hope, Mr. Lyon ?” An anxious, 
half-terrified look had come into his eyes, as of one 
who had felt himself borne helplessly away. “I 
am almost in despair. My will, in which I thought 
myself so strong, has failed, and I cannot trust it 
again. It is weaker for my fall, and must grow 
weaker and weaker every recurring fall. Do you 
know anything about inebriate asylums ?” 

He asked the question abruptly, and with the 
manner of one who had forced himself to do some- 
thing from which he had been holding back with a 
strong reluctance. 

“ There are the Sanitarium at Media, and the New 
York State Inebriate Asylum at Binghampton,” I 
answered. 

“ Do you know anything about either of them ?” 

I did not. 

“ Did you ever hear of any one being cured at an 
Inebriate Asylum ?” 

“ Oh, yes.” 

“ Who ? Can you find me the man ?” 

“ No case has come under my personal observa- 


AS BY FIRE. 


65 


tion; but I remember reading in a New York 
paper not long ago a very strong report on the good 
work which had been done at the State Asylum.” 

“ Do you know anything about the treatment ?” 

“ Only in a general way. The patient is removed 
from old associations, and out of the reach of temp- 
tations which he had become too weak to resist; 
brought under the influence of new social, moral 
and intellectual conditions ; and this for a period of 
time long enough to give him back the mastery over 
himself which had been lost. I remember, now, 
hearing a gentleman who had visited the Sanitarium 
at Media, say, that Dr. Parish regarded the cultiva- 
tion of the finest qualities of the head and heart in 
his patients as the true basis of a permanent recov- 
ery. He relief on that self-culture which promotes 
self-respect, a sense of moral obligation, and the de- 
velopment of a true manhood ; and when this con- 
sciousness was realized, he considered the founda- 
tions laid for permanent safety.” 

The eager expression which was on Granger’s 
face as I began my answer to his question, had left 
it by the time I ceased speaking. 

“ All a delusion,” he replied. “ If they can offer 
a man no other help, the number of their saved will 
be few.” 

“ They are many, I have been told.” 

He shook his head doubtfully and gloomily. 

“New associations,” said I, “the cultivation of 
new tastes, more vigorous thinking in the right 


66 


SAVED 


direction, a better understanding of tlie patliology of 
drunkenness, and above all, the formation of better 
habits, must help a man and give him a new advant- 
age in the struggle with appetite. These he will 
gain while under treatment in an asylum.” 

“ Have I not had nearly all of these for a year, 
standing by their help and that of my strong will 
in the very face of temptation? And yet there 
came an hour in which they were as threads of flax 
in a candle flame I You don’t know anything about 
the wild rush this passion of drink will sometimes 
make upon a man. It is like the sweep of an irre- 
sistible flood. 

“ Look here !” He drew from his vest pocket a 
slip of paper. “ I cut this out of a newspaper to- 
day. It has frightened me. God only knows where 
I am drifting ! It may be to a fate as dreadful. 
This slip of paper gives, briefly, a few facts in the 
life of a man who once stood high as a clergyman, 
and afterwards represented his State in Congress. 
But drink cursed him and he fell to the lowest level. 
Recovering himself, he enlisted in the temperance 
cause and became not only one of its warmest cham- 
pions, but rose to the head of the Order of Good 
Templars in the State of Indiana. But he died ere 
he had reached his fortieth year and from conges- 
tion of the brain, caused by a relapse into intem- 
perance !” 

“ Sad enough ! Does the slip give his name ?” 

“ Let me read it : ‘ Schuyler Colfax, in a recent 


A8 BY FIRE. 


67 


letter referring to the death of J. J. Talbot, of In- 
dianapolis, says : “ He has made hundreds of elo- 
quent and touching appeals for temperance all 
over our State within the past two years, but told 
me that the appetite would sometimes become so in- 
satiate as to almost defy control, though he prayed 
on bended knee for strength to resist it. I remem- 
ber the terrible picture of his own experience copied 
in the enclosed article. He delivered it here, to a 
crowded audience, hundreds of whom, like myself, 
were in tears, and he uttered it in desponding tones 
that seemed almost like the wail of the lost, and as 
if he felt his impending doom was inevitable.’ ” 

“ The extract referred to by Mr. Colfax, is as fol- 
lows : ‘ But now that the struggle is over, I can 
survey the field and measure the losses. I had po- 
sition high and holy. This demon tore from around 
me the robes of my sacred office, and sent me forth 
churchless and godless, a very hissing and by -word 
among men. Afterward I had business, large and 
lucrative, and my voice in all large courts was heard 
pleading for justice, mercy and the right. But the 
dust gathered on my unopened books, and no 
foot-fall crossed the threshold of the drunkard’s 
office. I had moneys ample for all necessities, but 
they took wings and went to feed the coffers of the 
devils which possessed me. I had a home adorned 
with all that wealth and the most exquisite taste 
could suggest. This devil crossed its threshold and 
the light faded from its chambers ; the fire went out 


68 


SA VED 


on tlie holiest of altars, and, leading me through ita 
portals, despair Avalked forth with her, and sorrow 
and anguish lingered within. I had children, beau- 
tiful, to me at least, as a dream of the morning, and 
they had so entwined themselves around their 
father’s heart that, no matter where it might wander, 
ever it came back to them on the bright wings of a 
father’s undying love. This destroyer took their 
hands in his and led them away. I had a wife 
whose charms of mind and person were such that 
to see her was to remember, and to know her was to 
love. * * * For thirteen years we walked the 

rugged path of life together, rejoicing in its sun- 
shine and sorrowing in its shade. This infernal 
monster couldn’t spare me even this. I had a 
mother who for long, long years had not left her 
chair, a victim of suffering and disease, and her 
choicest delight Avas in the reflection that the lessons 
which she had taught at her knee had taken root in 
the heart of her youngest born, and that he Avas 
useful to his fellows and an honor to her who bore 
him. But the thunderbolt reached even there, and 
there it did its most cruel Avork. Ah, me ! iiCAmr a 
Avord of reproach from her lips — only a tender 
caress; only a shadow of a great and unspoken 
grief gathering over the dear old face; only a 
trembling hand laid more lovingly on my head; 
only a closer clinging to the cross ; only a more 
piteous appeal to Heaven if her cup at last Avere not 
full. And while her boy raved in his wild delirium 


AS BY FIRE. 


69 


two thousand miles away, the pitying angels pushed 
the golden gates ajar, and the mother of the drunk- 
ard entered into rest. 

“ ‘ And thus I stand : a clergyman without a cure; 
a barrister without brief or business ; a father with- 
out a child ; a husband without a wife ; a son without 
a parent ; a man with scarcely a friend ; a soul 
without a hope — all swallowed up in the maelstrom 
of drink.’ ” 

Several times, as he read, the voice of Mr. Gran- 
ger gave way and he had to pause in order to recover 
himself. His hand shook so that he was obliged to 
lay the slip of paper down on my table to keep it 
steady. His eyes were wet and his face strongly 
agitated. 

“Such a devil is the devil of drink!” he said, 
bitterly, shutting his teeth hard and clenching his 
hands. “ Cruel as hell ; pitiless as the grave I” 

“ And knowing that he is so cruel and so pitiless, 
Mr. Granger, why place yourself for an instant in 
his power ?” 

He put his hand to his collar and drew it away- 
from his throat, as if he were choking. 

“ The case seems well nigh hopeless.” There was 
a mournful despondency in his voice. 

“ Say not so. That of Mr. Talbot is largely ex- 
ceptional. There must have been with him an 
inherited appetite.” 

I was looking at Mr. Granger, and noticed a 
change pass over his face, which had become sud- 


0 


SAVED 


clenly pale. ' There was a startled expression in his 
eyes. 

“ A what ?” he asked, a little breathlessly. 

“ An inherited tendency.” 

“You don’t imagine there is anything: in that, 
Mr. Lyon?” 

“ Undoubtedly there is,” not at the moment think- 
ing of any application by Mr. Granger of my 
remark to his own case. “ The law of transmission 
is well established. Children not only inherit the 
physical likenesses and peculiarities of their parents, 
but their mental and moral qualities also. A de- 
praved appetite in a father will, if indulged, be 
surely transmitted to his child.” 

“ What hope for the child, then ?” 

“ All hope, if he hold the appetite as a wild beast 
sleeping. It cannot hurt him while it sleeps. But 
let him beware how he awakens it with a taste of 
blood on its tongue. No inherited evil can hurt us 
until we give it a new life in ourselves. Until then 
it is only potential.” 

No light came back into Granger’s countenance. 
There was about him a statue-like stillness and a 
fixedness of look, as though he were gazing at some- 
thing strange and almost fearful. 

“This gives the case a new aspect, Mr. Lyon.” 
There was a forced quiet in his voice as he said this, 
turning to me as he spoke. I saw another change 
in his countenance, which now bore signs of con- 
scious weakness. He gave me the impression of one 


AS BY FIRE. 


71 


who had folded his arms in the face of danger, all 
confidence in effort gone. “ A man may repent and 
he saved from the curse of his own transgressions, 
but if the sin of his father be laid upon him, what 
hope is there of salvation ?” 

The truth flashed on my mind. Here was a case 
of inherited appetite; and the victim’s first sus- 
picion of the fact had destroyed in him, for the 
time being, all remaining faith in the value of resis- 
tance. 

“ The case is only the harder,” I replied ; “ but 
not desperate. There must be a more vigilant watch 
and ward; a more earnest and never-ceasing conflict; 
a daily death-grapple with the foe, if need be. And 
is not freedom from his infernal power worth all 
this?” 

“ Worth it? Aye ! Worth all a man may do or 
dare!” 

There swept into his face the flush and strength 
of reviving confidence. 

“ Did the criminality of this thing never strike 
you ?” I asked, determined to try the force of a new 
incentive. 

“ Criminality ?” He gave a kind of start, and the 
warmer color which had come into his face died 
out. 

“ Nor the perpetual danger in which one who lets 
the devil of drink get possession of his brain stands 
of becoming a criminal before the law ? The deeds 
of a devil are very apt to be devilish.” 


72 


SAVED 


He set his eyes on me with a fixed stare, waiting 
my farther speech. 

“ Your profession makes you familiar with the 
causes of crime,” I continued, “ and you know that 
over seventy per cent, of the crimes and vicious acts 
which the law punishes by fines, imprisonments or 
death, are caused by inebriation.” 

He still gazed at me without speaking. 

“ Groot is an inoffensive man while sober, but a 
brutal fiend when drunk. When sober, he would 
not have injured a hair of Mr. Leonard’s head — 
drunk, he made a cowardly and murderous assault 
upon him.” 

Granger drew a deep, quivering breath, but made 
no reply. I went on. 

“ No man who takes this devil into his brain, so 
giving him the control of will and action, can tell 
what may be the consequences. When he gets back 
into himself again, there may be blood upon his 
hand! Whose blood? Is the insane drunkard 
careful in his discriminations ? Is the beloved 
wife, or sweet young daughter, or innocent babe, 
in no danger? What say the records of our 
courts ?” 

I paused, for the face of the lawyer had become 
intensely agitated, and there were beads of sweat on 
his forehead. 

“This criminal aspect of the case,” I resumed, 
seeing that he made no response, “is one of the 
most serious that drinking presents ; and is not the 


AS BY FIRE. 


73 


man who, to gratify a mere appetite which he knows, 
if indulged, will destroy his moral sense, and induce 
temporary insanity, as guilty of the crimes he may 
commit while intoxicated as if he had committed 
them sober ? A good citizen will see to it, that he 
does not wrong his neighbor ; and a good husband 
and father that his wife and children have care, pro- 
tection and love. Is he a good citizen, or husband, 
or father, who voluntarily transforms himself into 
a cruel and destructive demon ? The crime and re- 
sponsibility of this thing cannot be escaped, Mr. 
Granger, and I press upon you, in all solemnity, 
this view of the whole sad question. If you go away 
from here, and, before reaching your home, suffer 
appetite to draw you back again into the vortex 
from which you are trying to escape, and on the 
outer edge of which you are resting now, who 
can tell whether to-morrow may not find you at 
the bar of justice, with crime written on your fore- 
head!” 

Granger started to his feet and threw up his 
hands with a bitter cry, then clasped them tightly 
across his forehead. He stood for several moments 
in this attitude, his manner that of one in swift 
debate. 

“No, Mr. Lyon, not that — not that!” he said, 
huskily, as he turned to me. “ Not a criminal !” 

He sat down again, as if from sudden loss of 
strength. I saw that he was trembling. 

“ I trust not, Mr. Granger. But there is no more 


74 


SAVED 


imraunity for you than for another. These drink- 
devils are no respecters of persons. If you let them 
in you become their slave, and no one can tell how 
soon, nor how deeply, they may lead you into crime 
and disgrace.” 

He gave an involuntary shudder. After this, we 
talked more calmly. The idea of criminality be- 
came a central one in his mind. It had never before 
occurred to him. He was a man of sensitive honor ; 
and this thought of crime against society, and 
against his family, wrought with him strongly. Not 
alone the crime of violence, as at first presented, hut 
the crime of robbery towards those who had a claim 
on him for services and protection, I was careful 
to go over the ground with hini as widely as possible; 
and especially to dwell on the great crime against 
wife and children which a man commits who robs 
them through the waste and self-wrought incapacity 
of drunkenness. 

Granger sat with me for a whole hour, gathering 
up motive for a new struggle with his enemy, and 
setting his mental forces in array. The idea of 
criminality in drunkenness took, I was glad to see, 
a deeper and deeper hold upon him. He was very 
severe on himself, in referring to the wrongs his 
family had once suffered; and did not hesitate to call 
his conduct towards them an aggravated crime. 

“ You have helped me to my feet again,” he said, 
holding my hand tightly, as he was about leaving 
my office, “ and may God bless you ; not for my 


A8 BY FIRE. 


75 


sake only, but for the sake of my wife and children. 
A criminal ! No, no, no ! A good citizen, an hon- 
orable man ; Alexander Granger will be all these — 
but not a criminal ! Good-bye ! I am your debtor 
more than can be estimated in any count of gold. 
Good-bye, and again, may God bless you !” 



CHAPTER VI. 

DESPERATE STRUGGLING. 


M y confidence in Granger’s ability to control 
his appetite by means of the new moral ele- 
ment which had been summoned to his aid, was not 
as strong as I could have wished. A serious ground 
of fear lay in the fact, which had been fully admitted, 
of his father’s intemperate habits, for I clearly un- 
derstood the subtle power of all transmitted inclina- 
tions ; especially when by indulgence these inclina- 
tions are lifted above the region of latent impulse 
and become a living force, the hereditary and the 
acquired acting in the same direction. How power- 
ful had been their action in the case of Mr. Granger, 
was manifest in his sudden fall after a whole year 
of abstinence. In this renewed struggle, was he 
not weaker, and these combined forces stronger, than 
before? I could not get my mind free from the 
depressing effects which were wrought in me by this 
view of the case. 

But my anxieties were apparently groundless. 
Granger stood firm again ; and I had cause for 
renewed and stronger hope in the permanence of his 
reformation in the fact that he was less boastful as 
to his strength, and more careful to keep as far away 
from temptation as possible. I made it a duty to see 
76 


AS BY FIRE. 


77 


him frequently, and to give him all the moral sup- 
port in my power. There were times when he 
talked to me very freely about his old life, and about 
the latent force of the old serpent of appetite on 
which he had set his heel. 

“ I am painfully conscious,” he said to me, one 
day — it was several months after his sudden fall, 
and quick recovery of himself again — “ that appe- 
tite is only held down by force ; and that at any 
moment it may give a vigorous spring and seek to 
throw its slimy folds around me.” 

“ And for this cause you are always on guard,” I 
replied. 

“ Always.” 

“ Herein lies your safety. You are stronger than 
your enemies ; but, to be safe, must never unbuckle 
your armor nor lay aside your shield.” 

“Always a soldier; always in front of the enemy; 
always standing on guard ! It is a hard life for a 
man to live. How I long, sometimes, for peace and 
rest and safety !” 

“ Better to stand always in full armor than to give 
the slightest advantage to your cruel foes. You 
know too well what falling into their power 
means.” 

“ Alas ! too well. But,” he added, with a serious 
contraction of the brows, “ is there no time in the 
days to come, when these enemies shall be wholly 
destroyed or cast out? Am I never to dwell in 
safety ?” 


/ 


78 


SAVED 


He looked at me with strong and eager question- 
ings in his eyes. 

“Sometime, I trust.” My reply had in it no 
assuring quality. 

“ Sometime ! When ? In this world, or only in 
the next ? — in Heaven, if I ever should he so for- 
tunate as to get there ?” 

“ Your enemies will grow weaker the longer you 
hold them down; and will you not be a steady 
gainer in strength for every day and year you keep 
this mastery over them? Every day and year 
dwelling more and more secure ?” 

“ What do you understand by dypsomania ?” he 
asked, abruptly. 

“ It is a term used by some medical writers to 
designate what they regard as confirmed inebriety — 
when the will-power is completely overthrown, and 
the demands of the diseased organism for alcoholic 
stimulus becomes so great that the man is literally 
crazy for drink,” I replied. 

“What do they say about it? — the medical 
writers, I mean.” 

“ They give but little ground for hope of cure in 
one so demented.” 

“ Demented ? Ah ! I can well believe it. Crazy 
for drink! I have seen men so.” 

“When this condition is fully developed, these 
writers say, the brain has become deteriorated in 
quality, and its functions impaired. All the higher 
faculties are more or less weakened. Reason, judg- 


AS BY FIBE. 


79 


ment, perception and memory lose tlieir vigor and 
capacity. The will becomes feeble and powerless. 
All the moral sentiments and affections become 
involved. Conscience, a sense of accountability, and 
of right and wrong, are all deadened, while the 
lower propensities and passions are aroused, and ac- 
quire a new strength. Another effect has been 
observed: No influence can frighten or deter the 
miserable subject from indulging his passion for 
drink. To gratify it, he will not only disre- 
gard every consideration of a personal nature 
affecting his standing in society, his pecuniary con- 
dition, or the well-being of his family, but the most 
frightful instances of disasters and crimes, as the 
consequences of drinking fail to have any effect 
upon him. A hundred deaths from this cause, oc- 
curring under the most revolting circumstances, fail 
to impress him with an adequate sense of his own 
danger. He would pass over the bodies of these 
wretched victims without a thought of warning, in 
order to get the means of gratifying his own insa- 
tiate thirst. Such, according to medical testimony, 
is the dypsomaniac ; or, as some say, the subject of 
confirmed alcoholism ; and he is considered as mor- 
ally insane.” 

“ Fearful !” ejaculated Granger ; “ and we tamper 
with a. substance that can work such ruin to the 
souls and bodies of men.” 

“ There is something mysterious in the action of 
this substance on the human body and its func- 


80 


SAVED 


tions,” I replied. “So seductive and pleasant in its 
first effects — so enticing and so alluring; yet so 
deadly and destructive in the end. An almost in- 
visible bond at the beginning and, and light as a 
spider’s thread, but at the last an iron fetter.” 

“ I met with an extract from a medical journal 
to-day that gave me a startling impression of inse- 
curity,” said Granger. “As you intimated, there 
must be something occult and mysterious in the 
way alcohol works its insidious changes in the human 
economy. We know, alas ! too well, that here effect 
does not cease with the removal of the cause. The 
thirst, which increases the more it is indulged, is 
not extinguished by prolonged denial. The man 
never gets back to his normal state — to a point where 
a single glass of liquor will produce no more desire 
for a second glass than did the first he drank in 
youth or early manhood. One would suppose that, 
after a longer or shorter period of abstinence, the 
man would regain his old condition, and be able to 
taste wine or spirits without immediate danger. 
That the appetite, if indulged, would have only 
gradual increase as before. But all experience and 
observation testify that this is not so, and the extract 
from a medical journal to which I have just referred 
professed to give the pathological reason.” 

“ And what is the reason so given ?” I asked. 

“ It startled me, as I have said,” he answered. 
“ The statement alleges that a physician of some 
eminence made careful examination, by dissection, 


AS BY FIRE. 


81 


of the blood and internal organs of persons who, 
before death, had used intoxicating drinks freely, 
and found in these subjects an enlargement of the 
blood globules, as well in the brain as in the other 
organs, so that they stood, as it were, open-mouthed, 
athirst always, and eager for drink.” 

“ But,” I said, “ abstinence from alcoholic bever- 
ages must, in time, change this condition, and the 
blood globules shrink to their old dimensions.” 

“ The fact does not bear out the inference. It is 
farther stated, that the physician referred to, after 
clearly ascertaining the existence of this morbid 
change, had the opportunity to dissect the brain of 
a man who, after being a drunkard for many years, 
reformed and lived soberly until he died. His sur- 
prise was great when he discovered that the unnat- 
urally large globules of the blood had not shrunk 
to their proper size. Though they did . not exhibit 
the inflammation seen in the drunkard’s brain, they 
were enlarged, and ready, it seemed, on the instant, 
to absorb the waited-for alcohol, and resume their 
old diseased condition. The conclusion to which 
the physician came was given in the brief article. 
He believed that he saw in this morbid state of the 
brain the physical part of the reason why a man 
who has once been a drunkard can never again as 
long as he lives, safely take one drop of alcoholic 
liquor. He thought he saw why a glass of wine 
put a man back instantly to where he was when he 
drank all the time. He saw the citadel free from 
6 


82 


SAVED 


the enemy, but undefended — incapable of defence — • 
its doors wide open, so that there was no safety 
except in keeping the foe at a distance, away beyond 
the outermost wall.” 

“If this be true, every reformed man should 
know it,” I said. “The statement is remarkable, 
and great pains should be taken to ascertain, by 
repeated examinations, whether it hold good in other 
cases or not. That there is a change in the physical 
condition of inebriates, we all know ; and we also 
know that this change is permanent. But whether 
it be in the blood globules or not, the fact itself 
should stand as a perpetual warning to men who 
have at any time been the slaves of this appetite. 
And 1 do not think, Mr. Granger, that you should 
find in the philosophy of inebriation here educed 
anything to discourage you, but rather a new motive 
for keeping your foe at a distance, away beyond the 
outermost wall, as has been said.” 

“ But the citadel incapable of defence — its doors 
wide open ! Think of that, Mr. Lyon !” 

“ Yes ; but the enemy dislodged, and driven over 
the frontier — held in the far distance, and the man 
able, if he will, to hold him there forever.” 

“ Ah ! yes, yes. The old story. No safety but in 
eternal vigilance.” Granger spoke as one who felt 
weary and despondent. 

“ But safety. Don’t forget that, my friend ! Peace 
and safety. Bich harvest-fields, and secure abiding. 
Are not these worth all the vigilance one may give?” 


AS BY FIRE. 


83 


“Yes, yes; his eternal vigilance!” He roused 
himself as he spoke. “What a weak coward I am! 
But I know my enemy, and the vantage ground he 
holds.” 

“ The vantage ground is yours, instead,” I made 
reply. “ Don’t forget that ; and let each new reve- 
lation you get of your enemy’s strength, alertness 
and malignant hate, only act upon you as a new 
motive for watchfulness. Let the resolute will that 
held you safe for a whole year, add its strength to 
the new motives and considerations which are in- 
fluencing you now.” 

He withdrew his gaze from me, and remained in 
thought for a considerable time. 

“ You are not a church-member?” lifting his eyes 
to my face. I noticed a new quality in his tone of 
voice. 

“ No ; I have never connected myself with any 
religious society.” 

“Why not?” 

“ It might be difficult to assign a reason that would 
be entirely satisfactory to any but myself, seeing 
that I am a reverent believer in Holy Scripture and 
in the divinity of our Lord and Saviour Jesus 
Christ. But I do not And in the sphere of worship, 
in the ordinary range of preaching, and in the 
practical illustrations of Christianity seen in the 
lives and conversation of most of the church-mem- 
bers I happen to know, anything to awaken a desire 
to cast in my lot with ‘ God’s people,’ as they are in 


84 


SAVED 


the habit of styling themselves. They have too 
much cant of Sunday piety and too little week-day 
charity to suit me. The teachings of Christ are 
very explicit, and no man is a Christian, let him 
profess what he may, who does not live according to 
His divine precepts. To be a Christian, means a 
great deal more than to be called by His name ; as 
so many really seem to think. To join a church, 
and take part in its worship and ordinances, doesn’t 
make a Christian. It may make a self-deceiving 
Pharisee or hypocrite; which is to be in a more 
dangerous spiritual condition than that of honest 
unbelief. I have too deeply-seated a reverence for 
these things to enter into them lightly, or to make 
of them a stepping-stone to influence and respecta- 
bility, as I fear is so frequently the case.” 

Mr. Granger drew a long sigh as I stopped speak- 
ing, and I saw a disappointed expression in his face. 

“ Have you thought of joining the church ?” I 
inquired. 

“Oh, yes! I’ve thought of everything.” He spoke 
with a slight disturbance of manner. “ But the 
question has always been, ‘ What help will the 
church give me?’ and so far the answer has not 
been satisfactory. That case of Mr. Talbot, about 
which we talked once, has been a source of consid- 
erable discouragement. He was a clergyman, you 
know, in the church, and one of its teachers ; and 
yet the church did not save him from drunkenness.” 

“ And you remember,” I added, “ that he used 


AS BY FIRE. 


85 


often, as he said, to pray to God on bended knees 
for strength to resist the demon of drink, but all 
without avail.” 

“Yes; I remember it.” His voice despondent, 
and a gloom settling over his face. 

What did this mean ? The truth began to dawn 
on me. There had been one reserve of hope left in 
the mind of Granger. When all else failed, he 
would go to God for help ; and in my seeming de- 
preciation of the church as a means of rescue, had 
I not well nigh destroyed this hope ? 

“You do not believe in thu value of prayer?” 
He put the question sharply. 

“ I must reject the Bible if I reject the value of 
j)rayer. It is full of exhortation to pray. ‘Watch 
and pray, lest ye enter into temptation,’ are the words 
of our blessed Lord himself. But you will notice 
that the first injunction was to ‘ watch this is the 
man’s part. If he be not watchful — ever on guard 
and ready to resist the tempter — his prayers will be 
offered in vain. In the clergyman’s case, prayer on 
bended knees could not have been supplemented 
with a due degree of watchfulness. In far too many 
cases prayer goes for nothing, I fear. Is a man 
secure from robbers if he only pray for protection, 
and give no care to the bolting and barring of his 
house ? Or saved from drowning, if he put to sea 
in a leaky vessel, trusting that God will keep the 
wretched craft afloat through the agency of prayer ? 
There must be praying and working, asking and 


86 


SAVED 


doing ; the putting forth of our utmost strength, at 
the same time that our cry for help goes up. This 
is my idea of effective prayer.” 

There came back into Granger’s face a more as- 
sured expression. 

“ I see reason in that,” he said. “And yet,” after 
a pause, “how much easier just to cry out, as Peter 
did, ‘ Save, Lord !’ and be saved without an effort to 
bear yourself above the engulfing water.” 

“ Did Peter make no effort ?” I asked. 

“ None. He just cried out, ‘ Lord, save me !’ ” 

“ What was he doing ?” 

“Trying to go to the Lord over the angry 
waters.” 

“ Walking, as steadily as he could, on the turbu- 
lent billows. Walking, you see ; trying to get to 
Jesus ; doing his best. And this means, I think, 
that we must do something in the way of going to 
the Lord besides mere looking toward him and call- 
ing upon Him. We must endeavor to walk — that 
is, to live right — and the first step in right living is 
to ‘ cease to do evil.’ He who thus tries to go to 
Chrjst, over the tempestuous waves of sin that leap 
about his feet, will, when his ‘ Save, Lord,’ breaks 
out in a half-despairing cry, find himself grasped by 
one who is mighty to save.” 

The strength of his countenance increased. 

“You have given me some light. Help does not 
come to effortless weakness.” 

“ Not the help that saves a man from the wretch- 


AS BY FIRE. 


87 


edness that sin has brought upon him. He sinned 
freely, and God did not hold him back from sin 
with a force greater than his will, for that would 
have been to destroy in him all that makes him 
human, his rationality and his freedom. As he 
sinned freely, breaking God’s laws, so he must re- 
pent and return freely. He must come back of 
himself, as did the Prodigal Son ; but God will see 
him afar off and run to meet him, and throw His 
loving arms about him and rejoice over him. But, 
in all this. He will not touch his freedom ; will do 
nothing for him in which the man does not, as it 
were, do the things for himself, God being his 
helper.” 

I saw Granger’s countenance begin to fall again. 

“ If I could only see it clearly,” he answered. “If 
I only knew just how God saves to the uttermost all 
who come unto Him.” 

“ Don’t let us talk any more about it just now,” 
I replied; “it is disturbing your mind, and that 
isn’t good. Hold fast where you now stand; re- 
sist all allurement; give no place to the enemy, 
and while keeping vigilant watch, pray for help 
from God. You will be safer for this, I am 
sure.” 

He sat silent for a little while, and then, as he 
arose, said, speaking as if to himself : “ Except the 
Lord build the house, they labor in vain who build 
it; except the Lord keep the city, the watchman 
waketh in vain.” 


88 


SAVED 


I did not think it well to make any reply. He 
stood for a few moments, as if waiting my response; 
but as I gave none, he wished me a good-day and 
retired. 



CHAPTEE VII. 


ANXIOUS PEARS. 

I HAD been drawn, in this interview with Gran- 
ger, a little away from my old mooring ground 
of thought, and I sat for a long time in deep reflec- 
tion, trying to get many things clear that were veiled 
in obscurity, and to discover just where I was drift- 
ing. This question of prayer as an agency of 
strength and salvation to weak, repentant, sin-bur- 
dened souls, was one, I could see, of infinite import- 
ance. There was, with a large class of pious people, 
a loose way of talking about prayer, and a manner 
of praying that was, to my mind, not only irrever- 
ent, but foolish and utterly valueless. Of all the 
Sunday services, the prayers to God, especially those 
that were extempore, had been most distasteful to 
me, and oftenest the repelling influence that kept 
me away from church. There was a familiar way 
of addressing God, and of using His name in vain, 
that shocked me, for my reverence for the Divine 
Being, a reverence implanted in childhood, has 
always been very strong, and I have never been able 
to pronounce any of the names by which He is 
called without a falling inflection of the voice which 
has become instinctive. 

I did not, as a consequence, have much faith in 
89 


90 


SAVED 


the prayers that I usually heard in public, too many 
of which were mere bits of effective oratory, instead 
of a humble submission of the will to God. How 
often, as I listened wearily to one of these long 
prayers, full of vain repetitions, has the divine sen- 
tence, “ God is a Spirit, and they that worship Him 
must worship Him in spirit and in truth,” come into 
my mind, causing me to wonder that the preacher 
had forgotten it. 

And now there pressed in upon me the question, 
in what does the power of prayer consist? Does it 
change the Lord’s attitude toward man, or only 
man’s attitude toward God ? Does it bring down 
the sunlight into a darkened chamber, or only open 
the windows that its beams may enter ? How it 
might change man’s attitude toward God, I could, in 
a measure see ; but not how it could change the un- 
changeable, render the All-Loving more tender and 
compassionate, or make the Infinite Father more 
concerned for His sin-sick, lost and perishing child- 
ren, for whom He had bowed the heavens and come 
down. 

I saw that in the right understanding of this sub- 
ject lay momentous things ; and I was anxious to 
reach a true perception of all that was involved in 
prayer as a means of divine blessing and favor. My 
thinking did not get me far beyond a rejection of 
the idea that any change in God’s purposes toward 
man could be wrought in Him by prayer. If He 
were infinitely wise and infinitely loving. He must 


AS BY FIRE. 


91 


not only know better what external condition was 
best for a man than the man could know for himself 
but in the orderings of His providence must so 
arrange all things that he would be kept there until 
his changing state required, for his good, a new 
position in life. 

But in what way did prayer change man’s rela- 
tion to God ? I felt that the truth lay here, but 
was not able to see it clearly ; and I thought and 
thought until I grew weary and perplexed, and for 
relief of mind turned myself away from the sub- 
ject. 

Several months passed after this interview with 
Mr. Granger, and though we met occasionally, the 
subject about which we had talked so earnestly was 
not renewed. I learned through my wife that he 
came to church with his family now and then ; and 
the fact always gave me pleasure, for I had a grow- 
ing impression that there was a sphere of safety 
about the church, and especially for one like Gran- 
ger. There was in the very fact of his going to 
church an acknowledgment of weakness on his part, 
and a certain looking to God for strength and pro- 
tection. And I had an old and well-settled convic- 
tion which had come up with me from childhood — 
inwrought, I doubt not, through my mother’s teach- 
ings — that in any and every turning of the soul to 
God, no matter how little the turning, it must 
receive a measure, large or small, of strength to 
resist the evils to which we are all so much inclined. 


92 


SAVED 


I liad been going oftener to cliureh myself of 
late, and though my reason did not give assent to 
all the preacher said, and I was shocked now and 
then by his irreverent way of addressing God, and 
his too frequent and needless use of Divine names 
in order to give force to a sentence, or to make an 
oratorical climax, I was still able to gather into my 
thoughts many things that gave me light for clearer 
seeing, and strength for steadier walking in the path 
of life. I was growing less captious and critical — 
less annoyed at what I did not like, and more earnest 
to obtain whatever good was to be had in the reli- 
gious services that were held on Sunday. I found 
myself taking a new interest in the lessons which 
were read from the Bible, many passages from which 
struck my mind with a singular power, and left an 
impression of deeper import than I had ever before 
seen in them. I often found myself pondering one 
and another of these passages, and giving to them 
an aiDplication which altered my thought of God 
and of His ways with the children of men. I no- 
ticed changes in my states of mind, when listening 
to the Word of Sacred Scripture — I had for some 
years neglected reading it for myself — that occurred 
to me as remarkable. There sometimes fell upon 
me a deep tranquillity, as if I had passed from the 
unrest of this world into the peace of Heaven. And 
there would come, at times, states of self-forgetful- 
ness, and a desire to give my life for others. I often 
dwelt on these things, wondering what they meant. 


A& BY FIRE. 


98 

Was there not a power in the Word of God, which 
did not appear in the sense of its letter, but which 
flowed into the mind with that sense as a soul into 
the body ? 

The Word of God! What does this mean? The 
question came to me one day with such force and 
distinctness, that it seemed as though spoken by a 
living voice. The Word of God ! Could that be 
like a man’s word; limited, feeble, finite? Was 
there any ratio between them ? I thought of the 
many loose interpretations which I had heard ; of 
the contentions and angry discussions about the 
meaning of this and that expression in the letter ; of 
the divisions and uncharitableness, and persecutions 
even, which were so sadly rife in the Christian 
world, and all because men vainly imagined that 
human reason was equal to the comprehension of 
Divine wisdom ; and set the metes and bounds of 
their narrow doctrine about a Revelation from God 
in which were divine and infinite things that must 
remain forever above the reach of man’s unaided 
reason ; and which only the Spirit of God can make 
known. 

I marvelled often at the low range and dull 
platitudes of the pulpit , at the stereotyped vague- 
ness of exhortation, and at the small influence of 
preachers. There were exceptions, of course; but 
how few ! With the Word of God as the basis of 
Christian teaching, and especially with the Word of 
the New Testament, in which our Lord himself, in 


94 


SAVED 


the human nature which He assumed in the world 
and made divine, gives in no hidden forms of speech, 
the laws of spiritual life, through the keeping of 
which alone man can be saved ; w'ith all this, how 
strange to hear from the men who have been chosen 
to stand as watchmen on the walls of the city, so 
little about keeping the commandments in their 
inmost spirit as the only way of salvation. “ He that 
keepeth my commandments, he it is that loveth 
me.’ 

A dull, rambling sermon, or one in which the 
preacher showed how much more he knew about 
history, philosophy, poetry and art than he did 
about divine things, would send me home disheart- 
ened, and with a disinclination to go again, which 
sometimes held me away from church service for 
weeks. But there was in me a growing hunger and 
thirst for things spiritual. I wanted to gain a clear 
and more rational idea of God’s relations to and 
dealings with man, and a knowledge of the exact 
way in which He saved him. 

The better influences of church-going on my own 
mind gave me encouragement for Granger. I felt 
sure that he would come within a sphere of protec- 
tion ; that, somehow, he would be brought into new 
associations as to his spirit, and be less in danger 
when exposed to assault. 

“ I haven’t seen Mr. Granger at church for three 
or four Sundays,” said my wife, one day. “ I hope 
there is nothing wrong with him again.” I saw a 


AS BY FIRE. 


95 


shade of concern creep into her face. “ He’s been 
attending quite regularly in the past few months.” 

“ I saw him on the street only a few days ago,” I 
replied. “ There was nothing wrong about him then; 
at least nothing that I observed.” 

And yet, as I said this, I remembered that I had 
noticed in him something that left a vague question 
in my mind. But it had passed away and been for- 
gotten until my wife’s remark brought it back again. 

“ I fancied — it may only have been fancy,” Mrs. 
Lyon said, “ that Mrs. Granger’^ face looked more 
serious than usual.” 

“ Only a fancy,” I replied; but still I felt a weight 
of concern settling down upon my feelings. It re- 
mained with me all day and troubled me as I went 
to my office on the next morning. I had made up 
my mind to see Granger during the forenoon, but 
pressing business kept me at my office until two 
o’clock, when I returned home to dinner. 

“ Have you seen Mr. Granger ?” asked my wife, 
as I came in. There was an air of suspense in her 
manner. 

“No. I intended calling on him, but had an 
unusually busy day.” 

“ If I’m not very much mistaken, I saw him,” she 
said. 

“Where?” 

“ Going into a saloon on Sansom Street.” 

“ No ; you must have been mistaken.” 

“ I wish I could think so ; but if the man I saw 


96 


SAVED 


entering a saloon, as I passed down Twelfth Street, 
was not Mr. Granger, then there was a remarkable 
likeness in the general appearance of the two men.” 

“ Did you see his face ?” 

“ Only for an instant. He was at the door of the 
saloon just as I came in sight of him, and in the 
next moment had disappeared. His manner was 
that of one who wished to avoid observation. I am 
almost sure it was Mr. Granger.” 

I had but little appetite for my dinner. In the 
afternoon I called at the lawyer’s office, but did not 
find him there. Next day I met him on the street. 
His manner was not quite as frank and cordial as 
usual ; but beyond this I saw no change in him. It 
was plain that my wife had been mistaken. My 
first impression was one of relief; but a feeling of 
complete confidence did not return, and there was a 
weight on my heart which I could not throw offi 

Granger was not at church on the following Sun- 
day. His wife and daughter were in attendance as 
usual, and there was now no mistaking the fact that 
a portion of light had gone out of their faces. In 
the afternoon I called to see him, but he was not at 
home. About ten o’clock on the next day I dropped 
into his office, and found him with a segar in his 
mouth reading a newspaper. He had, apparently, 
just arrived, for his green bag lay unopened on the 
office table. He started up on seeing me, coloring 
a little, and extending his hand with what seemed 
to me an excess of cordiality. I looked for the color 


AS BY FIRE. 


97 


to recede from his face until the skin was restored 
to the old healthy clearness, but either my eyes de- 
ceived me, or the ruddy tinge did not fade out 
entirely. 

Granger was not completely at his ease, though 
evidently trying to be so. I remained for only a 
short time, as my call was not a business one. Our 
conversation did -not pass beyond the common-place 
topics of the day. 

“ Call in again. I’m always glad to see you,” he 
said, with the same excess of cordiality which he 
had shown on meeting me. 

I was far from feeling satisfied. 

“ How is our friend Granger ?” I asked of a mu- 
tual acquaintance not many days afterwards. 

“ Not doing right, I’m afraid,” he answered. 

“ Why do you think so ?” 

“ I’ve seen him two or three times of late when I 
fancied him the worse for drink.” 

“ May you not have been mistaken ?” 

“ Possibly.” 

“ Why did you fancy he had been drinking ?” 

“ There are signs which one rarely mistakes,” he 
replied. 

“ If he should get off again,” I said, “ there will, 
I fear, be little hope for him.” 

“ Very little. But he’s been down and up a great 
many times, you know.” 

“ Yes ; hut in the very nature of things he must 
grow weaker with every fall.” 

7 


98 


SAVED 


“Of course.” 

“ What is to he done about him ? It’s dreadful 
to see a man going headlong to destruction. Is there 
no way to save him ?” 

“ None that I know of. When this appetite is 
once established with a man, his case becomes almost 
hopeless. Every step he takes is downward. He 
may stop now and then, and hold himself back 
against the downward drag, but when he moves 
again the eourse is still down, down, until the gulf 
of ruin is reached at last. Is it not frightful ?” 

I felt a chill creep through my veins There 
seemed in his words a prophecy of utter ruin for 
Granger. 

“ He has stood firm, with only a single brief fall, 
for nearly two years,” I said. 

“ And he might stand to the end, but not if he 
dallies with the fatal cup,” was answered. “ No man 
in whom the appetite for drink has once been formed 
can ever taste and be secure. Only in perfect ab- 
stinence is there perfect safety. The old appetite 
lies sleeping, hut not dead. Rouse it with a glass of 
wine, or beer, or spirits, and it will spring upon the 
man with the old intense life, and he will be as a 
feeble child in its grasp. If Granger is indulging 
again, he will fall again. He may, through a reso- 
lute will, hold himself for a little while above excess; 
but every glass he takes is food to the old desire, 
which will grow stronger and stronger until its mas- 
tery is again complete.” 


AS BY FIRE. 


99 


“ It doesn’t seem right to hold ourselves away 
from him in so momentous a crisis — to leave him in 
the sweep of the current and not make an effort to 
save him,” I said. 

“ I doubt if anything can be done. At your first 
approach, he will either take offense, or utterly re- 
ject your intimation that he has been indulging 
again. I know these men. Lying seems to be one 
of the fruits of drinking. Liquor is almost sure, 
earlier or later, to take the truth out of a man — 
especially in anything that relates to his cups, so 
long as he yields to indulgence. Men will assure 
you, even asking God to witness the truth of what 
they say, that they have not taken a drop of liquor 
for weeks, when its odor from their lips is rank in 
your nostrils. I know of nothing that so takes truth, 
and honor, and all that is good and true and noble 
out of a man, as this alcohol. It is a very hell- 
broth !” 

I could not rest. To stand away from Granger 
in' this new peril, would, I felt, be little less than 
criminal. How to approach him without giving 
offense was the question I had to consider. The 
opportunity soon came. 



HAPTEE VIII. 


DECEIVING HIMSELF. 



DAY or two afterwards, as I stood talking 


-AA- with a friend in the Continental Hotel, I saw 
Granger pass into the bar. I moved to a position 
from which I could observe him. He called for a 
glass of ale, and drank it off at a single draught. 
His manner was slightly nervous and a little hurried. 
I threw myself in his way as he left the bar, and 
noticed a start of surprise when his eyes rested on 


me. 


“ Ah ! Lyon. Glad to see you !” The salutation 
was given with heartiness. But he did not look me 
steadily in the face. We walked out into the street, 
both silent until we reached the pavement. 

“ I’m sorry about this. Granger,” I said. 

“ About what ?” He affected not to understand 
me. , 

“You cannot use ale and be safe. You know 
this as well as I do.” 

His lips closed tightly, and his brows fell. We 
walked for a little way, neither of us speaking. 

“ Come round to my office, and let us have a talk 
about this matter,” said I, as we reached the next 
corner. 

“ Not to-day.” He drew out his watch and looked 


100 


A8 BY FIRE. 


101 


at the time. “ I have an engagement with a client 
But don’t give yourself any trouble about me, Lyon, 
I’m all right” 

“ But to-morrow may tell a different story,” I re- 
plied. “No, no. Granger! You must not go a 
step farther in this way. A precipice lies just be- 
yond !” 

“Another time; but now I must hurry to my 
engagement.” Saying which, he left me abruptly. 

My concern was great. That he could stand se- 
cure feeding his old, fierce appetite with a glass of 
ale now and then, I knew to be impossible, and he 
knew it as well — only, subtle desire was pressing for 
indulgence, and blinding him with false assurances. 

I did not see him again for two or three days, 
though I had twice called at his office. At last I 
found him in. It was late in the afternoon, and I 
could see from the color of his face that he had 
been drinking, though not to excess. He received 
me with the old friendliness of manner, and without 
any sign of embarrassment. 

“ You’ve come for that talk with me, I suppose,” 
he said, smiling, and with a twinkle in his eyes. 
“All right. You see I’m not down in the gutter, 
for all the prophecy that was in your face the other 
day.” 

There was a certain lightness of tone and manner 
about him, that in view of the subject to which he 
referred, almost shocked me. He must have noticed 
this, for he added, in a more serious voice: “I 


102 


6 '^ VED 


know how you feel, Mr. Lyon, hut let me assure 
you that I am in no danger of falling back into 
that wretched slough from which you helped to ex- 
tricate me. I have too vivid a remembrance of its 
suffocating mire and horrible foulness ever to let my 
feet go near its treacherous margin again.” 

“ What and where are the margins of this dread- 
ful slough ?” I asked. 

He did not answer. 

“ I saw you on one of these margins, your feet in 
the very slime of the pit, only a few days ago.” 

A smile broke over his face. 

“ Your way of putting it. But, seriously, Lyon, 
I am not in the danger you think. How long do 
you suppose it is since I’ve been using a little ale 
every day ? More than two months. I was getting 
run down from too close application to business, and 
the doctor said I must have a tonic. ‘ Take a glass 
of stout or bitter ale with your dinner,’ he said. Of 
course that couldn’t be. My wife would have been 
frightened to death.” 

“ Did the doctor know anything of your previous 
life?” I inquired. 

“ Can’t say about that. He may or he may not.” 

“ Your regular family physician ?” 

“ No. Haven’t had a regular doctor in the family 
for three or four years.” 

“And you have followed his prescription ?” 

“ Yes ; only I don’t take the ale Avith my dinner. 
I’ve felt like another man ever since. Can do more 


AS BY FIRE. 


103 


work with less exhaustion. Have a clearer head, 
and more elastic feelings. The ale simply gives a 
needed tonic, which the system absorbs, and there 
the matter ends.” 

“You think so?” 

“ I’m sure of it.” 

“ With all your sad experience, Mr. Granger, to 
take so fearful a risk !” 

“ I know how the thing looks to you, Mr. Lyon ; 
and I know how it stands with me. I am not taking 
this ale to gratify an appetite, but simply as a tonic, 
which my system requires. Here lies my safety. I 
am not off guard for a single moment. I am not 
only using the will-power which held me secure so 
long, but motives of good citizenship, and love and 
duty towards my family are more powerful than 
ever. If appetite attempts to lift its head again, I 
shall set my crushing heel upon it. I am standing 
in the strength of a true manhood.” 

“ Have you forgotten,” I said, “ that testimony of 
a physician in regard to the enlargement of the 
blood globules in the habitually intemperate ?” 

Granger made a slight gesture of impatience as 
he replied : “ Nothing in it. I’ve talked with half 
a dozen physicians and scientific men on the sub- 
ject.” 

“ But, apart from that particular theory,” I said, 
“ the fact remains, as you know, that in a man who 
has once been intemperate, certain changes in the 
state of the body have been wrought, which remain 


SAVED 


104 

permanent. Whether this change he in the blood- 
globules or not, the imminent danger of the man, 
should alcohol be introduced into his blood, is just 
the same. The truth or falsity of the physician’s 
theory in no way touches the essential facts in the 
case.” 

As I spoke, I saw a quick, startled motion of his 
eyes, but it was gone in an instant. 

Have you forgotten Mr, Talbot ?” I asked. 

“ Such cases are exceptional,” he replied, with a 
toss of the head. “We don’t meet with them once 
in an age.” 

“The history of intemperance is the history of 
such cases,” I replied. “ You are deceiving your- 
self. Thousands and thousands of such men go 
down to dishonored graves every year. My dear 
friend, you are taking a fearful risk !” 

Granger drew a little away from me with a slight- 
ly offended air. 

“We shall see,” he answered, somewhat coldly, 
and then changed the subject. I tried to come back 
to it again, but he pushed it aside with so manifest 
a purpose not to continue the discussion th^t I had 
nothing left but silence. 

Every day I looked for his fall. But it did not 
come suddenly, as I had feared. The usual business 
hour found him at his office with each new morn- 
ing, and his presence in court was as prompt and as 
regular as usual. But there was not an obseiwant 
friend or acquaintance who did not see the steady 


AS BY FIRE. 


105 


change that was in progress. It was slow, hut sure. 
The man was most warily on guard ; limiting his 
appetite — holding it down — saying to it, “I am your 
master. So much and no more. Enough for tonic 
and strength, but nothing for indulgence.” And yet, 
from a single glass of ale a day, the concession to 
appetite had reached, at the end of three months, to 
as many as three or four, by which time the strong 
will, and the motives of interest, honor and affection, 
in which he had entrenched himself, were beginning 
to show signs of weakness. 

I met him one day about this period of his declen- 
sion. It was in the court-room. I had been drawn 
thither through my interest in a case in which he 
appeared as counsel for the defendant, a man on 
trial for his life — an old man, gray-headed, bent and 
broken — one of the saddest wrecks I had ever seen. 
This man had once been a successful merchant, and 
the possessor of considerable wealth. I well remem- 
ber the time when he occupied a handsome residence 
on Walnut Street, and when his wife and daughters 
moved in the best social circles of our city. But his 
head was not strong enough for the wine that proved 
his betrayer, and in the very prime and glory of his 
manhood he began to fall. Methodical habits, and 
the orderly progression of a long-established busi- 
ness, kept him free from losses in trade for some 
years after his sagacity as a merchant had left him. 
But the time came when the tide began to turn ad- 
versely. Younger partners, who had new ideas of 


106 


SAVED 


business, were impatient of slow gains. Into tbeir 
hands came a larger and a larger control of things, 
and the opportunity for speculation. As in all other 
kinds of gambling, trade speculations lead surely to 
ultimate losses. Winning is the exception ; loss the 
rule. It took only a few years to bring the firm to 
bankruptcy. 

The merchant never recovered himself. Capital 
gone, and brain and body enervated by intemperance, 
he did not even make a struggle, and at the age of 
fifty-five dropped out of useful life, and became a 
burden, a shame and a sorrow to his friends and 
family. An income in her own right of a few hun- 
dred dollars possessed by his wife, saved them from 
utter poverty. There were two beautiful daughters, 
as refined and intelligent as any you meet in the 
most cultivated circles. Alas for them ! The pleas- 
ant places in which they had moved saw them no 
more. 

Ten years later, and the broken merchant, in a 
frenzy of delirium brought on by drinking, struck 
down his wife with a blow that caused her death. A 
trial for murder was the consequence, in which Mr. 
Granger conducted the defense. One of the saddest 
and most painful features of this trial was the appear- 
ance in court of the two daughters as witnesses, and 
the evidence they were compelled to give. I can see 
them now, with ten years of sorrow and humiliation 
written in their pale, suffering faces, as they stood in 
the witness-box, tearful and reluctant. Pity made 


AS BY FIRE. 


107 


even tlie lawyers tender and considerate in pressing 
their examination ; but enough came out to give the 
heart-ache to nearly all who were in the court-room. 
It was one of the most painful scenes I had ever 
witnessed. 

When all the evidence was in, and Mr. Granger’s 
turn came to address the jury in behalf of the 
prisoner, the pause and expectation became breath- 
less. The poor old white-haired man bent toward 
him with a helpless, anxious face, and the two 
daughters sat pale with suspense, their eyes riveted 
on the man who was to plead for the life of their 
father. 

“ Gentlemen of the jury.” His subdued voice, in 
which a slight tremor was apparent, made deeper 
the silence of the hushed court-room. It was genuine 
emotion that came thrilling in his tones, not the art 
of the pleader. There was a waiting and a holding 
of the breath for his next words. Turning slowly, 
he looked at the old man and at the two white-faced 
women — his daughters — and stretching out a hand 
toward them, said, his voice still lower than at first: 
“The most sorrowful thing I have seen in this court- 
room since my admission to the bar !” 

There is no form of words by which to convey any 
true conception of the pity and deeply moving pathos 
that were in his voice. 

“The most sorrowful thing, gentlemen of the 
jury!” turning partly round to the jury-box. “ I 
need not tell you what it means. The pitiful story 


108 


SAVED 


has been fully rehearsed. You know it all. There 
was once an honorable merchant, a tender husband, 
a loving father. The city was proud of him. His 
name was the synonym for high integrity and gener- 
ous feeling. His home was the dwelling-place of all 
sweet affections. But an evil eye fell upon the mer- 
chant and his happy home. The locust and the 
canker-worm found their way into his garden of 
delight. Leaf withered and flower faded, and sing- 
ing birds departed. Under the spell of this evil eye, 
the generous merchant lost his wealth and his fine 
sense of honor, the husband his tenderness and de- 
votion, the father his love. A demon had taken 
possession of his soul, subsidizing all its noble 
powers, and making them the ministers of evil in- 
stead of good. Shall I tell you the name of this 
demon ?” 

He paused for a few moments. Then with a slow 
utterance and deep impressiveness : “ It was the 
demon of strong drink! You all know him. You 
cannot walk the streets of this great city — this Chris- 
tian city — without feeling his hot breath strike into 
your faces a hundred times an hour! His wretched 
victims are everywhere about us; and the homes he 
has ruined may be counted by tens of thousands all 
over the land. Where has not the blight of his foul 
breath fallen ? Whose home is free from the curse 
of his presence? 

“ Look !” He turned to the prisoner and his 
daughters. “All that the demon has left! Ah, gen- 



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AS BY FIRE. 212 

tlemen ! lie is a pitiless demon, and without respect 
of persons. 

“And now what shall I say for my poor, unhappy 
client? For this man whom the devil of drink has 
held in chains for these many, many years, and made 
the creature of his infernal will. Who wronged and 
beggared his family — the man, or the devil that was 
in him ? The man was kind, and tender, and loving. 
The man cared for his wife and his children, and 
would have given his very life, if need he, for their 
safety. Years of unselfish devotion to those he loved 
bear him witness. You have heard the testimony of 
his daughters; and I think your eyes must still re- 
main half-blinded by the tears with which their 
touching story filled them. No, no ! It was not the 
man who dealt that cruel blow. He would never 
have laid on the dear and precious head of his faith- 
ful wife a stroke as light as that of a feather’s fall. 
It was the devil who did it, and not the man. The 
devil of drink. 

“No, gentlemen! You cannot find the man 
guilty of murder. He was only a passive instru- 
ment, with no more responsibility for crime than the 
club with which a ruffian fells a citizen, or the pistol 
with which an assassin does his fatal work. It was 
the devil who did it. Ah I if the law could only 
reach this devil !” 

The jury retired on the conclusion of Granger’s 
plea, and were not out for half an hour. The evi- 
dence had been very direct and clear. The prisoner 


112 


SAVED 


had developed in the past year an irritable and ma- 
lignant spirit, and would grow violent and threaten- 
ing when his wife refused him money. It was 
proved that he had struck her several times, and 
that she had once carried the marks of a blow in 
her face for many weeks. In the evidence bearing 
on the cause of her death, it was shown that her 
husband had been wrought into a paroxysm of 
insane anger by her refusal to give him money, and 
that in his blind passion he had knocked her down. 
The blow was a violent one. When her daughters, 
who had heard the heavy fall of her body, reached 
the room and attempted to lift her from the floor, 
she was dead. 

At the end of half an hour, the jury came in 
with a verdict of guilty of murder in the second 
degree, and a recommendation to mercy. Granger 
had remained in the court-room while the jury was 
out, taking part in another case that came up for 
trial. I saw from his manner that a strong impres- 
sion, from which he had not been able to break free, 
had been left on his mind by the incidents of the 
trial just closed. The two daughters of the prisoner 
remained in the court-room, waiting for the verdict 
in their father’s case. More than once I noticed 
Granger’s eyes resting upon them with a pitiful, 
almost sad expression. Was he thinking of his own 
daughter and their mother, and of the demon that 
might desolate their home and drag them down to 
a fate like this ? 


A8 BY FIRE. 


113 


When the verdict came, and the wretched pris- 
oner was removed, under a sentence of three years’ 
incarceration in the penitentiary, I saw Mr. Granger 
go out with the two daughters, who moved through 
the crowd with bent heads and slow, uncertain steps. 
What a heartache the sight gave me ! As I reached 
the street, I observed him enter a carriage with them 
and drive away. I was touched by his considerate 
care and kindness. 

“Ah,” I said to myself, “ if he will but take this 
awful lesson to heart, and cast out once and forever 
that devil of drink to which he made, a little while 
ago, such an eloquent and telling reference.” 

I felt a strong hope that this would be so. That 
the incidents of this trial, and his absorption into it 
as counsel, would make so deep an impression on 
Granger as to cause him to start back in alarm from 
the brink of the precipice on which he was stand- 
ing, and over which he might at any moment 
plunge. That he had been strongly moved was very 
evident. It was not possible for him to look on the 
wrecked and ruined family of the old merchant, or 
to contemplate the awful tragedy which had been 
enacted, without a shudder at the thought of such a 
catastrophe reaching his own home. He was dally- 
ing with the devil of drink, who might at any mo- 
ment bind him hand and foot, as he had once before 
bound him, and make him again the creature of his 
will. 

It was about eight o’clock in the evening, two 


114 


SAVED 


days after the trial, that I was informed by a ser- 
vant that a lady was in the parlor and wished to see 
me. She had not given her name. On going down 
I was met by Mrs. Granger. I saw the worst at a 
single glance. It was written, alas ! too plainly in 
her face. 

“ I would like to have some talk with you, Mr. 
Lyon,” she said. Her voice was low and steady ; 
hut I could 'detect an under thrill of feeling held 
down by a strong effort. 

“ I am entirely at your service,” I replied, using 
the first form of speech that came into my mind. 
“And if I can be of any use to you, command me 
freely.” ^ 

“ You know about my husband.” The firmness 
went out of her voice. 

“ What about him ?” I had neither seen him nor 
heard anything in regard to him since the day of 
the trial. 

“ Haven’t you heard ?” 

“ Heard what, Mrs. Granger ?” 

“ That he has — ” She could not finish the sen- 
tence ; her voice breaking in a sob, that was followed 
by a low, shivering cry. 

“I am pained beyond measure to hear of this,” 
said I. “ How long has it been ?” 

“It has been coming on him for two or three 
months past, and I’ve been in awful dread. Little 
by little, day by day, his old appetite has gained 
strength! What the end must be, I knew too well.” 


A8 B Y FIRE. HQ 

“ I saw him in court on the day of that murder 
trial. He was all right then.” 

“ He has never been right since. It was late in 
the evening before he came home. His condition I 
will not describe.” Tears, in large drops, were fail- 
ing over her face. 

“ Has he been to his office since ?” 

“ I think not,” was answered. “ He goes out in 
the morning, and does not return until late at night. 
If I ask him a question, or venture a word of remon- 
strance, he gets angry. Oh ! sir ; this must not go 
on. I am helpless. He will hear nothing and bear 
nothing from me. It was not so once. But you are 
his friend, Mr. Lyon. He has great respect for you; 
and I know of no one who has more influence over 
him.” 

“Any and everything in my power shall be done,” 
I replied. “ My regret is that I did not know of 
this earlier.” I let more of hope and encouragement 
go into my voice than I really felt. " 

“ Oh ! sir. If you will only do your best for him.” 
The poor wife looked at me with a pleading face. 

“ Is he at home now ?” I asked. 

“ Oh, no, no. I haven’t seen him since morning, 
and it may be after midnight before he returns. 
Oh ! isn’t it dreadful, dreadful, Mr. Lyon, the way 
this fearful appetite takes hold of a man ! I thought, 
when he told me about that poor, old, broken-down 
merchant, who, in a fit of drunken insanity, had 
killed his wife, and whom he had to defend on a 
8 


116 


SAVED 


charge of murder, that he would take the terrible 
lesson to heart. The case had drawn largely on his 
sympathies, and his pity was great for the daughters 
who were to appear in court and give evidence that 
might send their father to the gallows. I have 
rarely known a case to affect him so much. And to 
think, Mr. Lyon, that he should go from this trial, 
with all its warning incidents fresh in his mind, 
and give himself into the power of the very agency 
which had wrought so fearful a ruin that the very 
sight of it sent a shudder through his soul ! There 
is something awful and mysterious in all this, sir ! 
It passes my comprehension.” 

“ And not yours only, ma’am. It is one of the 
dark problems men find it difficult to explain. Into 
all hurtful and disorderly things, evil forces seem to 
flow with an intenser life than into things innocent 
and orderly. There is violence, aggression, destruc- 
tion or slavery in every evil agency. And it is 
never satisfied under any limitation ; it must have 
complete mastery, or work complete ruin.” 

“A terrible thought !” Mrs. Granger shivered as 
she spoke. 

“ Will you try to find him to-night ?” she asked, 
a moment afterwards. 

“ Yes. I will go in search of him at once.” 

She arose to depart. 

“Wait for a moment; I will see you home 
first.” 

“ No, no, Mr. Lyon. I’m not afraid. Don’t lose 


[AS BY FIRE. 

an instant. I want my husband found as soon as 
possible.” 

And she went quickly from the room, passing into 
the street before I could make another effort to de- 
tain her. 




CHAPTER IX. 


CAST OUT. 

I WAS not successful in my search for Mr. Gran- 
ger, though. I visited many of the principal 
saloons, and met with several persons who knew 
him; but no one whom I questioned had seen him 
during the night. It vfas nearly twelve o’clock when 
I gave up the search. I was debating with myself 
whether to return to my own residence or to go, even 
at this late hour, and ascertain whether he were at 
home or not, when, on passing a small court in which 
a tavern was located, a sudden sound of angry voices 
struck my ears. As I paused I saw a man thrust out 
of this tavern with violence. He fell with a dull, 
heavy sound on the pavement; and was kicked as he 
fell. The door shut in an instant afterwards, and the 
man was left to all appearance unconscious or dead. 

I found a policeman in the next block, and after 
giving information as to what I had seen, was turn- 
ing to leave him, when he detained me, saying that 
if the man had received any serious injuries I might 
be wanted as a witness. I took out a card, and writ- 
ing my address on it, asked if that were sufficient. 
He said yes. I had gone from him for only a few 
paces when the possibility that the man I had seen 
might be Granger flashed through my mind, arrest- 
118 



‘*He fell with a dull, heavy sound on the pavement, and was kicked as 

he fell.”— lie. 


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AS BY FIRE. 


121 


ing my steps, and causing me to turn about and hurry 
back to the scene of the outrage of which I had been 
a spectator. The policeman was trying to raise the 
man from the ground ; but the latter was either so 
stupified by drink, or so stunned by his fall on the 
pavement, as to be unconscious of any effort to arouse 
him. What was my pain and horror to see, as the 
face was turned to the light, the features of Alexander 
Granger. There was a great bruise on one of his 
temples from which drops of blood were creeping 
out ; and his mouth was swollen as from a blow, and 
bleeding. 

By this time two or three men had come out of the 
saloon ; and I noticed that one of them, on seeing 
the policeman, dropped quietly from the court and 
disappeared around the corner. The others assisted 
to bear the unconscious man into the tavern. It was 
a low, vile place ; and the keeper a vicious-looking 
fellow, in whose eyes you saw the cruel instincts of a 
wild beast. He it was, as we learned, who had thrust 
Granger out ; but he denied having kicked him as 
he fell. The cause for this violence was a drunken 
dispute. An argument about something had arisen, 
and the brutal logic of the bully had been used 
against the lawyer, who was too much under the 
power of drink for prudent self-restraint. His words 
had been answered by blows; and the blows had 
been very hard. 

A physician was sent for, but before his arrival. 
Granger had partially regained his consciousness. 


122 


SAVED 


An examination of the wound on his head showed 
nothing very serious. His mouth, however, had be- 
come dreadfully swollen ; and the upper lip exhibited 
so bad a cut that it had to he closed with a few 
stitches and hands of adhesive plaster. 

“ There’s a very sharp pain just here, doctor,” said 
Granger, after the lip had been dressed, placing his 
hand to his side as he spoke. “ I wish you’d see 
what it means. There’s something wrong, I’m 
afraid.” 

“ Wrong ! I should think there was,” replied the 
doctor, as soon as he had made an examination. 
“ Here’s a rib broken !” 

A groan escaped the lips of the suffering man. 
Increasing pain was lifting him out of his drunken 
stupor. 

“ He had better be taken home at once,” said the 
doctor. “ I cannot attempt to set the broken bone 
here.” 

“ Oh, no. Don’t take me home !” Granger an- 
swered, quickly. “ The station-house. Anywhere. 
But not home.” His countenance was strongly agi- 
tated. 

“ To my house, then,” I said. 

“ No ! no ! no ! It’s considerate of you, Mr. Lyon, 
but I will not be taken into any gentleman’s house 
while in this condition. Why can’t the bone be set 
here ?” 

“ For reasons I will not attempt to explain,” said 
the doctor, speaking with decision. “ I think, sir,” 


AS BY FIRE. 


12e3 


addressing me, “ that you had better order a carriage 
and have him removed to his own house. I will 
accompany you, or you can send for his family phy- 
sician. In any case, take him home. The fracture, 
is, I fear, a bad one, and will require careful treat- 
ment.” 

Another groan came from Granger’s lips. “ If I 
were only dead !” he ejaculated. 

A carriage was sent for. "While waiting for it to 
come. Granger sat with closed eyes ; his face now 
almost deathly pale, and with beads of sweat standing 
all over it. He made no resistance when the carriage 
arrived, and entered it in silence, accompanied by the 
doctor, a policeman and myself. 

We were some ten or twelve blocks from his resi- 
dence, and it took over twenty minutes to make the 
distance, as the driving had to be very slow. When 
we had come within a few hundred yards of his 
dwelling, he asked to have the carriage stopped for 
a few minutes until I could go and break the news. 

Leaving the carriage, I went rapidly in the direc- 
tion of his house. A light was burning in one of the 
upper windows. What should I say ? How should 
I break this news to his poor, waiting wife ? As I 
drew near, I noticed a shadow on the wall of the 
chamber in which the light was burning ; a moving 
shadow as of one restlessly walking the floor. As 
the sound of my hurrying feet broke the silence I 
saw the shadow grow still fpr a moment, and then 
quickly disappeai-. I had scarcely rung the bell ere 


124 


SAVED 


the door was drawn swiftly open, and Mrs. Granger’s 
pale, almost rigid face met mine. 

“ Mr. Granger ! What of him ? Oh ! Mr. Lyon, 
have you found him ?” She had caught hold of me 
in her eagerness and siispense. 

“ Yes, yes. I have found him,” I replied. 

“ But where is he ? Why didn’t he come home 
with you?” 

“ He is coming. He will he here in a little while,” 
I said, trying to speak in a voice that would allay 
her excitement. 

“ In a little while! What’s the matter, Mr. Lyon ? 
Don’t deceive me ! Don’t keep anything back I Am 
I wanted?” 

I felt her hand close on my arm with a tight 
grip. 

“ Ho — no, Mrs. Granger. You are frightened for 
nothing. You are not wanted. Your husband will 
be home in a few minutes. I came first to tell you 
and relieve your mind.” 

At this moment the sound of approaching wheels 
was heard. 

“Is that Mr. Granger?” she asked, her face as 
white as ashes. 

“ Yes,” I replied. 

I saw that the whole truth had not occurred to her. 
She stood still, waiting until the slow-moving carriage 
was at the door, and not stirring until she saw the 
policeman step first to the pavement. Then there 
was a start and a repressed cry. Next came the 


AS BY FIRE. 


125 


doctor, and then, with the help of the policeman. 
Granger was assisted from the carriage. It was too 
dark for his wife to see his face until the light of the 
entry-lamp fell upon it as he was supported up the 
steps to the door. 

She did not faint, nor cry out in wild terror as she 
saw that bruised, pain-stricken face ; but, as if she 
had received a blow, staggered back a step or two, 
but quickly recovered herself, coming forward and 
saying, breathlessly, and in a hoarse whisper: 
“ What is it ? What’s the matter ?” 

“Nothing very serious,” the doctor answered. 
“ Your husband has had a fall, and there’s a rib 
broken. But he’ll be all right in a short time. We 
must get him up to his own room with as little delay 
as possible.” 

In a moment all signs of agitation disappeared. 

“ This way,” said the wife, calmly, moving back 
along the hall, and then going lightly up-stairs and 
leading the way to the chamber in front. How 
tender and pitiful she was in every word and act ; 
yet with no sign of weakness. Love and duty 
had lifted her into a sphere of calm self-posses- 
sion. 

I wondered as I observed her that night, moving 
about with a quiet, almost cheerful bearing, acting in 
concert with the doctor, ministering to her husband, 
giving and taking directions with the coolness and 
self-poise of an experienced nurse, what it meant ? 
I had expected a painful scene, with outbursts of 


126 


SAVED 


uncontrollable mental anguish; and my surprise was, 
therefore, the greater at what I saw. 

It was between two and three o’clock before I left 
Mr. Granger. By this time the broken bone had 
been properly set, and he was not only free from 
pain but sleeping quietly. 

I did not see him for several days, though I made 
frequent inquiries, and learned that he was doing 
well. A brief notice of the assault from which he 
had suffered found its way into the newspapers, 
but his name was not mentioned. No effort was 
made to arrest and punish his assailant, for that 
would have been to make his own disgrace pub- 
lic. 

It was nearly a week afterwards that I received a 
note, asking me to call upon him. He was greatly 
changed, and looked broken, subdued and troubled. 
His lip was still considerably swollen and very sore. 
The wound had not healed readily, and the proba- 
bilities were that a disfiguring scar would be left. 
He held my hand tightly for some, moments before 
speaking. 

“ I want to have another talk with you, Lyon,” 
he said, his voice trembling a little. “ I shall be 
out again soon, and then — ” He stopped, with a 
strong movement of feeling in his face. “ And then? 
God help me, Lyon ! Is there no hope — no escape — 
no way of safety ?” 

His agitation increased. I did not reply. AVhat 
could I say ? He saw the doubt in my face. 


AS BY FIRE. 127 

“ There must be help somewhere. Men are saved 
from this curse.” 

“ A man may be saved from any evil if he will,” 
I replied. “ But if he will not, as I have said to 
you many times, even God cannot save him. If you 
had kept away from the enemy’s ground, he could 
never have enslaved you again. You were free to 
pass over or to remain within the lines of safety. 
Of your own will you passed over.” 

“ Poor, weak fool !” he murmured, bitterly. “ Poor, 
silly moth, flying into the candle !” 

“ Let the days of weakness and folly pass forever. 
Let there be no more parleyings with the enemy — 
no more venturing upon his domain.” 

He shook his head gloomily. 

“Of what value are all my good resolutions? 
Will they save me in the future any more than they 
have saved me in the past ? Are they stronger to- 
day than they were last year or the year before ? 
There must be something more, Mr. Lyon. Some- 
thing stronger to lean on, or I’ am lost !” 

“ Lean on God,” I answered. “ Look to Him.” 

There was no brightening of his face. 

“ God helps those who try to get free from the 
sin that doth so easily beset them.” 

“ Hoes He ? Haven’t I tried ? Doesn’t He know 
that I have tried ? But where is the help ?” 

“ It cannot come to you except in your reasserted 
manhood ; and it will come if you stand fast in that 
manhood. God’s strength will be your strength.” 


128 


SAVED 


He sighed heavily. 

“ Mr. Gross was here yesterday, and I had a long 
talk with him about the New York Asylum at Bing- 
hampton. He thinks very favorably of the course 
pursued there, and spoke of several cases where 
j)atients have come home radically cured. He 
promised to send me the last report of the superin- 
tendent. If I thought any good would come of it, 
I’d drop business and everything else and go under 
treatment there.” 

I said nothing to discourage the idea. There 
might be influences brought to bear upon him at 
this institution which would help to give him 
the mastery over himself. I could not tell. 

At a subsequent visit, I found that the promised 
report had come into his hands, and that his mind 
was fully made up to leave for Binghampton as soon 
as he was able to travel, and spend as long a time 
there as the resident physician and superintendent 
thought his case required. 

“ It is a disease,” he said, as we talked the matter 
over ; “ and as clearly defined as any other disease ; 
and, moreover, as subject to remedial agencies. The 
best minds in the medical profession have given to 
this disease a most careful study, and it is known what 
organs are affected by it, and the exact character of 
the affection. Its treatment is based on true scien- 
tific and pathological principles, and so conducted ai 
to give the patient a just knowledge of the means 
whereby he may retain his health after a cure has 


AS BY FIRE. 


129 


been made. He is not left to grope in the dark, 
every moment in danger of falling over some unseen 
stumbling-block which may have been cast in his 
way.” 

i did not share in the new hope which had come 
to Mr. Granger, but was careful not to offer a word 
of discouragement. There might, as I have said, be 
influences brought to bear upon him at the asylum 
which would prove lasting. It was worth the trial 
at least. 

And the trial was made. Four months were spent 
by Mr. Granger at the institution in Binghampton, 
^ where the treatment for intemperance as a disease 
was at the time up to the highest skill and intelli- 
gence of the medical profession. The treatment 
was moral as well as hygienic and sanatory. The 
first thing gained for the patient was his removal 
from the tainted atmosphere of common society, in 
which are perpetually floating the germs of the dis- 
ease from which he was suffering. This was a most 
important gain, for it took him out of the region of 
exciting causes. His next gain was in the sanatory 
care and treatment given by the institution to its 
patients, through which a steady return to sound 
physical health was secured. Supplementing this 
was a thoroughly intelligent hygienic system, through 
which the health so regained was steadily improved 
atid strengthened. 

The moral and religious influences under which 
he came were of the most salutary kind. Free from 


130 


SAVED 


the morbid action of alcohol on the brain, his intel- 
lect and moral perceptions were clear once more. He 
could see and feel with a new intensity the' obliga- 
tions that were resting upon him as a man, and the 
awful responsibility to which he must be held if ‘he 
did not keep them. There was a quickening of his 
higher, purer and better feelings — of honor, and a 
sense of duty — of all the tender social affections. 
Love for his wife and children, and shame and 
sorrow for the wrong and suffering he had brought 
upon them, grew deeper and deeper as the cure went 
on. He wrote to me several times while in the in- 
stitution, and his letters were of the most satisfactory 
character. He had gained wonderfully in health, 
and felt, he said, no desire for alcohol whatever, and 
was sure that he should never touch it again. 

In the first letter that I received from him, he 
spoke of the incidents attendant on his arrival at 
the institution. I give a portion of this letter: 

“ On the second day,” he wrote, “ as I was sitting 
by myself, feeling strange and ill at ease, a little, old 
man, with a large head, clear blue eyes, and a kind, 
cheery face, came into the parlor, and seeing me, 
bowed with a courtly air, and said a pleasant ‘ Good 
morning.’ My response was somewhat cold and 
distant, for I was greatly depressed in spirits, and 
could not rally myself on the instant. He passed 
through, and as he left the room I felt my heart 
going out, as it were, after him. In about ten min- 
utes he came back, and, drawing a chair, sat down 


AS BY FIRE. 


131 


by me, with the remark, ‘This is one of our perfect 
days. Have you noticed the peculiar softness of the 
sky V I tried to rouse myself to meet, in a becom- 
ing way, his kind advances; but did it, I fear, 
almost ungraciously. It was only a little while, 
however, before the frank and genial warmth of his 
manner had completely won me, and I found my- 
self talking with him as with a pleasant friend. 
Almost before I knew it, he had led me to speak of 
myself, and of my past life. There was about him 
something that inspired confidence. I felt that no 
idle sentiment of curiosity, but a genuine interest 
in my welfare, had drawn him towards me, and that 
he was seeking to gain my friendly feelings, that 
he might do me good. He had not spoken half a 
dozen sentences before I recognized in him a man 
of culture, and saw in his bearing the true grace of 
a courtly gentleman. It was not long before we 
were walking the floor of the parlor, his arm drawn 
within that of mine, deeply engaged in a conversa- 
tion, which we kept up for over an hour. At its 
close, I felt that I had found a new friend, as it has 
proved, for this quiet, intelligent, refined and gen- 
tlemanly old man is none other than our chaplain.” 

Again he wrote: “In Dr. Bush, our chaplain, 
about whom I spoke in one of my letters, we have 
a man of rare fitness for the office he holds in this 
institution. I never pass an hour with him without 
feeling stronger for the interview. He said to me, 
a day or two ago, ‘ In God and good health lie your 


132 


SAVED 


only help and sure dependence. You must keep 
the body sound, avoid all dangers, and take no risks. 
With regular living, and healthy surroundings, and 
a mind full of faith and hoj)e in spiritual realities, 
this sad disorder, with which you have been afflicted, 
will, in time, die out.’ In his unobtrusive and wise 
way, he moves about among the patients, holding 
them in conversation by such themes as touch their 
tastes and habits of thinking most readily ; hut al- 
ways at some point turning their thoughts to spir- 
itual things, and f)ointing them to Christ as their 
surest refuge. He has great influence over all who 
are here, and there are some who appear to rest on, 
and cling to him as if all the strength they were 
receiving actually came through his agency. The 
more I see and know of him, and the more I talk 
with him, the stronger grows my conviction, that 
the saving power of the work that is being done 
here is largely due to the influence this good man 
has with the inmates.” 

In a letter written nearly two months after he 
entered the asylum, Mr. Granger said : 

“ I had a long talk with our chaplain yesterday, 
and he related many deeply interesting incidents 
connected with his offlce in the institution. He has 
a large correspondence, I find, with persons who 
have been patients here; and his influence with 
many of them is still very strong. He encourages 
them to write to him freely, and to tell him about 
their surroundings and peculiar trials and tempta- 


AS BY FIRE. 


133 


tions, in order that he may send helpful advice and 
wise counsel, if there should he need therefor. I 
notice that while he speaks minutely of cases, he 
rarely mentions names. But I refer to him now 
because of some things which he said that reminded 
me of a conversation I had with you. The line of 
thought he pursued was very similar to yours, 
though some of his premises and conclusions were 
different. ‘All of our power to resist temptation 
and to live true and orderly lives,’ he said, ‘ comes 
from God. The gift of strength is from above; 
the will to use it lies within ourselves. If we will 
not use this strength, God cannot help us in times 
of difficulty, nor save us in times of danger. But, 
into our right endeavor, if it be resolutely made, 
will come a divine power that shall enable us to 
stand as a rock, though the floods of temptation 
beat never so strongly against us. And here, my 
friend,’ he added, laying his hand upon me, and 
speaking with great earnestness, ‘ let me impress 
upon you this thought, that it is only in the main- 
tenance of true order in our natural and physical 
lives that we come into such a relation to spiritual 
laws and forces that they can protect and save us. 
A true spiritual life cannot be established in any 
one so long as his natural life remains in disorder. 
If you want God’s help in the new life you are now 
living, you must, while asking spiritual aid, do your 
part in the work of establishing sound physical 
health. Praying will avail nothing if you do not 
9 


134 


SAVED 


this also. When you go away from here you must 
make it a religious duty to avoid over-strain in your 
work, and the consequent nervous exhaustion that 
will surely follow. All the laws of physical and 
moral health must he strictly observed; and you 
must he especially watchful lest you get over, una- 
ware, upon the enemy’s ground. If duty calls you 
there, go with armor and sword, and you will find 
no armor so impenetrable, and no sword so keen and 
effective, as the armor of God’s Holy Word, and 
the truths that lie sheathed in its precious sentences. 
Use these when the tempter assaults you, and he 
will turn and flee.’ You can see how good and 
helpful all this is. ‘ Right thinking is one of the 
surest ways to right acting,’ we often hear him say. 
‘ If men would go right, they must know right,’ is 
another of his apt sentences. And he never tires 
in his efforts to supplement the medical, social, san- 
atory and moral agencies of cure that are so effect- 
ive in many cases under treatment here, with the 
soundest common sense advice, and the tenderest, 
most heart-searching and deeply solemn ministra- 
tions of a devoted spiritual friend and teacher.” 

At the end of three months. Granger considered 
his cure so complete that he wished to return home 
and resume the practice of his profession, which was 
suffering greatly on account of his absence. In this 
he was opposed by the superintendent, who urged 
him to remain longer ; in fact, not to think of leav- 
ing the institution until he had remained there for 


AS BY FIRE. 


135 


at least six months. The superintendent understood 
his case better than he understood it himself, and 
knew that he was very far from being cured. Treat- 
ing intemperance as a disease of the physical organ- 
ism, manifesthig itself in a species of moral insanity, 
and understanding enough of the pathology of 
drunkenness to know that it wrought changes of 
condition of singular permanency, and left a most 
remarkable sensitiveness to exciting causes, he un- 
derstood the great value of time in the work of 
strengthening the system, so that it might, when 
exposed to assault, be able to resist the encroach- 
ments of disease. But he was not able to induce 
Mr. Granger to remain at the institution for a longer 
time than four months. 

I met him soon after his return home. Four 
months under the new influences to which he had 
been subjected had wrought in him a marked 
change. I had never seen him in better physical 
health. His eyes were strong and bright, his com- / 
2:)lexion clear, his muscles round and tense. You 
saw that life, mental and physical, had gained a 
higher strength. 

“ I’m a new man, Lyon,” said he, confidently, as 
he grasped my hand at our first meeting. “ A new 
man,” he repeated, “ morally, mentally and physi- 
cally. The lost has been found ; the sick man re- 
stored to health ; the dead is alive again.” 

There was a certain overglow of enthusiasm about 
him to which I could not heartily respond. He 


136 


SAVED 


observed this, saying: “Wait and see, my friend. 
This isn’t the old, sick, miserable body that I took 
away, with its relaxed pores standing open to drink in 
every disease that floated in the air. Here is healthy 
blood, and Arm flesh, -and high vital action; and 
what is more, reason and will have regained strength 
and dominion. I have found my lost manhood.” 

“And may God give you the strength to keep it,” 
I made answer, speaking from a conviction which I 
could not repress, that only in God’s help was there 
any sure hope for this man. 

“ He has given it already,” he replied. “And I 
am taking it and using it. He is always giving ; 
and we faint and fall by the way only because we 
do not take of the measure we need. This is your 
doctrine, I believe, Mr. Lyon.” 

“ Yes,” I returned, but not with any heartiness of 
manner. 

“ Not skeptical here, I trust,” said Granger, with 
a slight lifting of his eyebrows. 

“ No. All our strength must come from God. In 
Him we live and move and have our being. The 
only question is, how are we to get this strength ? 
And I will confess to you, Mr. Granger, that my 
mind is not so well settled on this point as it was a 
year or two ago. I had great faith in a man’s will 
then. It is weaker now. And, if I must say it, 
out of your experience has come many of my doubts 
and questionings.” 

“ Indeed.” A shade of surprise in his manner. 


AS BY FIRE. 


137 


“ You remember that turning over of a new leaf 
a long time ago, and what Mr. Stannard said to you 
in regard to the writing thereon ? ■ About the ‘ I 
will not,’ and ‘ By the help of God ?’ ” 

“Yes.” 

“And how I said that we received God’s help 
only when we made an effort to do the right. That 
His strength flowed then into our endeavor, and 
only then ?” 

“Yes; and you said the truth.” 

“ But you did not find it so, Mr. Granger.” 

A deeper shade of surprise on his face. “ I did 
not use the strength. That was all.” 

“Why not?” 

“ The will failed, I suppose.” 

“Ah ! There it is. The will to take the strength 
was lacking.” 

“ Yes.” A falling away from its firmness in his 
voice. 

“ I’ve thought a great deal about this in the last 
few months. Granger, and I’m afraid there’s some 
error in my reasoning about God’s ways with man. 
That in our efforts to do right, or resist evil, a divine 
strength sufficient for our day will not always come. 
It seems to me that it ought to come ; but does it 
come ? What is your experience ?” 

“ I have had the strength to resist, as you know, 
and have stood in that strength for long periods of 
time,” he answered. 

“ True ; but it failed at last. Now God’s power 


138 


SAVED 


should never fail ; and I have a conviction that it 
never does fail. What then ?” 

He did not answer nfe. 

“ There is one sphere of safety into which I think 
it will be wise for you to come,” said I. 

“ What is that ?” he asked. 

“ The sphere of the church.” 

There was no warm response in his face. 

“ So far as my observation goes,” he replied, 
“ church people are no better than others.” 

“ More the shame for them,” I answered. “ But it 
is possible that your observation in this direction 
has been limited.” 

“ Well, as you know, I’ve never taken much to 
religion. I’m not one of that kind. I go to church 
with my wife occasionally, hut never get much in- 
terested. Now and then I hear a sermon that sets m e 
to thinking; but, for the most part, I find it dull work.” 

“ I inferred, from some things said in your letters, 
that you had become deeply impressed with the 
value and necessity of divine help,” said I. “ Did 
not Mr. Bush, the chaplain of whom you spoke so 
warmly, urge you to join some church, and to come 
within the sphere of its saving influences ?” 

“ Oh, yes. He spoke to me with great earnest- 
ness on this very subject. But a man may trust in 
God, even though he be not a church- member. 
Christianity means justice, and honor, and right 
living ; and I find as much of this outside as inside 
of the churches.” 


A8 BY FIRE. 


139 


“ The Church,” I replied, “ has been established 
by God. It is His kingdom on the earth ; and its 
laws are divine truths revealed to us in Scripture. 
These laws, as you know, are very pure, and based 
on love to God and the neighbor. It is nothing 
against the Church that some of its members do 
not comprehend the spirit and meaning of its laws; 
nor live in a true conformity thereto ; and nothing 
against its power to protect us from evil, if we come 
within the sphere of its influence.” 

“ You may be right in all that, Mr. Lyon ; are 
right, no doubt ; and I intend going to church with 
my family more regularly than heretofore.” 

“ Do so by all means. I had a long talk with Mr. 
Stannard only last week on this very subject of 
church-going ; and one or two things that he said 
have made a strong impression on my mind.” 

“ Mr. Stannard is one of the best men I ever knew. 
If all professing Christians squared their lives by 
their doctrines as he does, Christianity would mean 
something,” remarked Granger. “ What did he say?” 

“ If for no other reason, he said, we should go 
to church to hear the reading of the Bible.” 

“We may read the Bible at home, if we will,” 
Granger replied. 

“ True ; if we will,” I returned. 

“ And, then,” he rejoined, “ you know one may 
read the Bible every day, and a dozen times a day 
for that matter, and it will do him no good unless he 
obey its precepts.” 


140 


SAVED 


“ A knowledge of the law must go before obedi- 
ence. This is as true of divine as of human laws. 
But I wish to bring to your attention one or two 
things said by Mr. Stannard in regard to the power 
of Holy Scripture, and the sphere of safety into 
which it must bring every one who receives it into 
his thought reverently, and lets it dwell there. They 
were new to me. Being the Word of God, the pre- 
sence of any portion thereof in the thought, must, 
he said, bring, in a certain sense, God within us, and 
consequently nearer with His divine power to the 
enemies of our souls who are ever seeking to gain 
dominion over us ; so enabling Him to fight in and 
for us by the power of His W^ord.” 

Granger sat reflecting on this for a considerable 
time. 

“ If that be so,” he said, at length, “ there is a 
saving power in the Bible beyond what I had 
thought.” 

“ And a use in going to church beyond what you 
and I had imagined.” 

“Yes.” 

“ For the reading of the Bible makes up a portion 
of the services, and the sphere of reverence and 
attention which we find in worshipping assemblies 
adjnsts the mind to hearing and opens it to deeper 
impressions. The Word gets a firmer hold upon 
us and remains longer with us. We take it 
away in our memories; and when in temptation, 
can bring it out therefrom as a weapon — the 


AS BY FIRE. 


141 


sword of the Spirit — with which to fight our 
enemies. 

“Mr. Stannard said,” I continued, “that God’s 
Holy Word is sufiicient for us under any circum- 
stances of temptation; and that we have only to 
resist the devil as our Saviour resisted when led of 
him into the wilderness to be tempted, and he will 
depart from us.” 

“ How did He resist ?” asked Mr. Granger. 

“ By the utterance of truth from Scripture; and 
the power of this Divine Word was so great that the 
devil could not stand before it.” 

“ Yes, that is so. ‘ It is written,’ was the Lord’s 
answer. I never thought of its meaning before.” 

“ In the very way that strength for victory came to 
Him as He met the hosts of hell on the plane of His 
infirm human nature, will it come to us and give us 
the victory also, said Mr. Stannard. From this view 
of the case, the value of public worship is evident, 
and I am sure, Mr. Granger, that you will stand safer 
within than without the sphere of the church.” 

“ You may be right,” he answered. “ Nay, I am 
sure you are right. I must see Mr. Stannard and 
have a talk with him. He is one of the men in 
whom I believe.” 



CHAPTEE X. 


THE FLOODS’ RISING. 

Ij'^OE awhile Granger went regularly to church ; 
-L but after a few months his place in the family 
pew was often vacant. 

“ I don’t see you at church as much as usual,” said 
I, on meeting him one day. 

“ Well — no,” he replied, speaking with some hesi- 
tation of manner, “ and I don’t know that I’ve any 
valid excuse for staying away. But, the fact is, 

Mr. is so intolerably dull and prosy, I get tired 

to death. He doesn’t seem to think at all ; but just 
to open his mouth and let what happens to be in his 
memory come out. Old stereotyped forms of speech, 
and sentences that mean anything or nothing as you 
choose to interpret them, make up the staple of his 
sermons. You don’t get an advanced idea from him 
once in a month.” 

“ Go somewhere else. To hear Mr. , for in- 

stance. But don’t stay away from church.” 

“ I’ve been to hear Mr. a number of times. 

But one tires of mere picture-painting, though the 
artist have rare skill in his line. He says many 
beautiful things in an eloquent way ; and so do the 
orators and the poets. But a poor, tired and tempted 
soul will get little help from his preaching. It is 
142 


AS BY FIRE. 


143 


pleasing and popular ; but after that is said, about all 
is said. Ah, my friend !” his brows drew closely 
together, and his voice fell to a serious tone, “ your 
churches and your preaching are all well enough for 
easy-going, good sort of people, with a kind of 
natural heavenward drift ; but they don’t do much in 
the way of getting hold of us restless, challenging, 
hardened fellows, who want to know about the reason 
of things ; and who, unhappily, are in the drag of a 
current that is bearing us down, down, down, it may 
be, to eternal ruin !” 

There came a stern, almost angry expression into 
his face. 

You mustn’t feel in that way Granger. It isn’t 
good. The preachers may not be all we could wish; 
but they are, for the most part, sincere men, and in 
the effort to do the best they can for the salvation of 
souls.” 

“Oh, yes. No doubt of it. But it rarely happens 
that I find one who can feed my hunger.” 

"Was it his own fault or the fault of the preacher? 
Was he not hungering again for the flesh-pots of 
Egypt, and loathing the manna and the quails ? I 
had my fears. What had been done for him during 
his four months at the asylum ? It was a question of 
momentous interest. Had there been a cure, or only 
a temporary suspension of diseased action ? Did he 
not stand in as much danger to-day as before he 
placed himself under treatment? Was not his fall 
again only a matter of time? 


144 


SAVED 


These questions pressed themselves on my mind 
and gave me much concern. Think as closely and 
as earnestly as I could on the subject, I was not able 
to see wherein lay his immunity. He was back 
once more in an atmosphere tainted with disease. 
Predisposition had not been eradicated, and old 
exciting causes were acting again. As time went 
on, and the fine health he had brought home with 
him from the asylum gave place to the exhausted 
nervous condition which is sure, sooner or later, to 
follow excessive devotion to business, would not the 
old hunger for stimulants arouse itself and become 
irresistible ? 

The more I considere4 this vipw of the case, the 
more my concern increased ; and I felt that some- 
thing far more radical must be done for Granger 
than had yet been accomplished, ere his reform was 
a thing assured. His drifting away from church in- 
fluences was, I feared, only an indication of the 
awakening of old desires, and the turning of his 
thoughts downward to the things in which they had 
once found gratification. 

I was much relieved on the Sunday following to 
see Granger in church. He sat for most of the time 
during the services in an attentive attitude ; and it 
struck me that his manner was unusually subdued ^ 
and serious. I noticed that while a particular lesson 
from Scripture was read, that his eyes were not 
taken from the clergyman for a single moment. It 
was the one hundred and twenty-first Psalm : “ I 


AS BY FIRE. 


145 


will lift up my eyes unto the hills, from whence 
cometh my help. My help cometh from the Lord, 
which made heaven and earth. He will not suffer 
thy foot to be moved : he that keepeth thee will not 
slumber. Behold, he that keepeth Israel shall 
neither slumber nor sleep. The Lord is thy keeper: 
the Lord is thy shade upon the right hand. The 
sun shall not smite thee by day, nor the moon by 
night. The Lord shall preserve thee from all evil : 
He shall preserve thy soul. The Lord shall pre- 
serve thy going out and thy coming in from this 
time forth, and even forever more.” 

Other passages read or chanted during the ser- 
vices, seemed as if especially designed to meet his 
case, and lead him to put a higher trust in God. 
“ They that trust in the Lord shall be as Mount 
Zion, which cannot be removed, but ahideth forever. 
As the mountains are round about Jerusalem, so the 
Lord is round about His people from henceforth 
even forever.” “ The Lord is nigh unto all them 
that call upon Him, to all that call upon Him 
in truth. He will fulfil the desire of them that 
fear Him : He also will hear their cry, and will 
save them.” “ Like as a father pitieth his children, 
so the Lord pitieth them that fear Him. For He 
knoweth our frame ; He remembereth that we are 
dust.” 

I did not get an opportunity to speak to Granger 
after church, but I was struck with the seriousness 
of his face as he passed along the aisle. His eyes 


146 


SAVED 


were cast down, and lie did not notice any one as he 
moved with the crowd. 

“ What do you think of Granger’s case?” I asked 
of Mr. Stannard, not long after this. 

“ I greatly fear for him,” was replied; 

“He has kept himself straight since his return 
from the asylum.” 

“ Yes ; but the saving power of such institutions 
has its limits. They are good as far as they go, and 
have helped to restore many men to good citizenship. 
I say nothing against them. I wish their number 
were increased. But there are cases in which they 
rarely, if ever, make permanent cures ; and Gran- 
ger’s is one of them. The appetite for drink has 
taken too deep a hold. For him, I fear, there is no 
help in man. Only God can save him ; and if he 
does not go to God, humbly and prayerfully, his 
case is next to hopeless.” 

“ I am sorry you take so gloomy a view of the 
matter, Mr. Stannard. Will not God help him un- 
less he pray to Him ?” 

“ Can He help him if he does not ?” 

“ I don’t know. There’s something just here that 
I do not clearly understand.” 

“ Can a mother feed her babe, though her breast 
be full, if it turn its mouth away ? It may be faint- 
ing with hunger, and the mother’s heart may be full 
of love and pity, but if it will not touch the paps 
what can she do ? Prayer is not an arbitrary ser- 
vice, but an attitude of the soul. A simple turning 


AS BY FISK 


147 


of the spirit, conscious of its own weakness and sin- 
fulness, to the source of all goodness and strength, 
and accepting what God is ever seeking to give ; but 
which He can only give to those who truly desire 
to receive. God is always coming to us and seeking 
to save us ; hut unless we turn to Him, and look to 
Him, our rescue is impossible. It is in ourselves 
that we are lost ; and if we will not come out of 
ourselves, wherein are all our pains and desolations, 
how can God save us ?” 

“ I don’t know. The way ought to he made very 
plain and easy.” . 

“ It is plain and easy. Only to turn from self to 
God. Only to take the hand that is forever reaching 
down. Only to ask and receive,” Mr. Stannard re- 
plied. “ God cannot give to those who will not take.” 

“ Yes, yes ; all doubtless true. But how shall one 
turn from self to God ? How grasp the hand that 
is forever reaching down? How take what God 
perpetually desires to give ?” 

“Only when a man feels that in and of himself 
he can do nothing, and that unless help come from 
above he must perish, can he really turn from self 
to God. Before that he trusts in his own strength ; 
and so long as he does this, divine strength cannot 
be given.” 

“Why not?” 

“ Can a man use what he will not take ? So long 
as one trusts in himself, he does not use the strength 
of another.” 


148 


SA VED 


“And so, until a man feel this utter helpless- 
ness, God will not reach down and save him ?” said I. 

“ Of what avail is God’s offered hand if the man 
will not take it? Of God’s strength if the man will 
not use it ? Not until he is in utter despair of him- 
self does he really accept help from above. Until 
then he trusts to an arm of flesh, and not to the all- 
conquering and all-sustaining power of God. In 
the very moment that a man comes into this state 
of despair and lifts thought and desire heavenward, 
he prays effectually ; takes hold of God ; gets his 
feet upon a rock; comes within the sphere of Divine 
protection ; is saved from the power of his enemies. 
Forever saved ? Yes, if he keeps his hold upon God 
and remains within the sphere of His divine pro- 
tection. How shall he maintain this hold ? Only 
through steady looking and right living. He must 
cease to do evil, and learn to do well. Must make 
the laws of God the laws of his life. If this be not 
done God cannot make him to dwell in safety.” 

“For a man like Granger, you think, there is no 
security but in the church ?” 

“ Unless he dwell in God, he cannot dwell secure ; 
and the church is God’s kingdom on the earth.” 

“ Does not Scripture say that the kingdom of 
God is within us ?” 

“Yes. God’s kingdom is a spiritual kingdom, 
and can have no real existence but in the souls of 
men. But it is internal and external, because man 
is internal and external ; and has its internal sane- 


AS BY FIRE. 


149 


titles as well as it external ceremonials and forms of 
worship. The laws of this kingdom are the pre- 
cepts of the Holy Word ; and only those who keep 
these precepts in the heart and life are really the 
subjects of this kingdom. All such are free from 
the power of hell; for God dwells in them and 
around them.” 

“ Must, then, a man join the church to come into 
God’s kingdom ?” 

“ I think he will find that kingdom by the way 
of a church door more easily than in any other way. 
We are none of us so strong that we can afford to do 
without the help that comes from association with 
our fellow-men. God did not make us to stand 
alone, but in mutual dependence. This is as true 
in spiritual as in natural things. And so the church 
to be a power with men must be external as well as 
internal.” 

“ You may be right about all this,” I made an- 
swer. “ Certainly I should feel more confidence in 
Granger’s reformation if I knew that he was oftener 
at church. I was glad to see him there last Sunday. 
But I have felt more concerned for him since then 
than usual. The reason may appear to you a little 
strange.” 

“What is it?” 

“ I have never seen his face so serious, nor his 
manner so absorbed, as they were during the services 
of the morning. While the lessons from Scripture 
were read, his eyes were scarcely turned for an tn- 
10 


150 


SAVED 


stant away from the minister. In all the church 
there was not, apparently, a more deeply interested 
listener.” 

“A reason for hope rather than concern,” said 
Mr. Stannard. 

“ That depends on the cause of this unusual so- 
briety of demeanor,” I answered. “My thought 
has been, that the long repressed appetite is begin- 
ning to assault him once more ; and that, day by 
day, the conviction is becoming stronger and stronger 
in his mind that it will, sooner or later, acquire the 
mastery again. His coming to church, and espec- 
ially his demeanor at church, may be the signs of 
his sense of weakness and danger ; an effort to gain 
help from higher influences — a half-desperate reach- 
ing out of his hands in the dark for something to 
which he may cling when the waters that are moving 
upon him rise higher and gain the force of a resist- 
less flood.” 

“If this be so he is turning to the Strong for 
strength, and seeking help where it can alone be 
found.” 

“ But don’t you see, that if this be so, Mr. Stan- 
nard, how desperate the case may be ? The floods 
are rising against him. He feels that his strength 
is going. He is half-blind — half-desperate. Will 
he take hold of God ? If not, what then ? Ah ! 
sir, I cannot but feel a low shiver of suspense as 
I realize, in thought, this awful crisis for a human 
soul.” 


AS BY FIRE. 


151 


“ In which it has only to cry out as it turns from 
self to God; ‘Save, Lord, or I perish!’ to be lifted 
from the flood.” 

“But if it fail in this? If it cannot, or will 
not?” 

“ There is no such thing as cannot for a tried and 
tempted soul. It can look to God, and take hold of 
God, if it will.” 

“ But,” I said, pressing the question, “ if it will 
not?” 

The light went out of Mr. Stannard’s face and it 
grew very sober. 

“ It was because of this ‘ I will not,’ ” he replied, 
“ that the Lord, in His tender mercy, bowed the 
heavens and came down into our very debased 
humanity, that we might see Him as a Divine Man, 
and feel the warmth of His compassion, and know 
Him as our friend and Saviour, and that He might 
inspire in us the ‘ I will,’ by which He could lift us 
hack again into the pure and happy life which we 
had lost.” 

“ But if this cannot now be inspired into the soul 
of Mr. Granger,” said I, “what then? Must he 
fall in his hour of trial and darkness ?” 

“ If the external strength which he has acquired 
be not sufficient for him — the considerations of honor 
and good citizenship ; of worldly ambition and pros- 
perity ; of love and regard for his wife and children ; 
of personal well-being and happiness, — and he will 
not take God’s strength instead, what shall save 


152 


SAVED 


him ? I know not. But let us Lope that he is going 
to God in the right way. I believe that he is.” 

“ Ah ! if one could know ! I feel that another 
great crisis has come to our friend. If he should 
not pass it safely, he may fall never to rise again.” 

“ He can never fall so low,” was answered, “ that 
God’s love will not be still reaching down and seek- 
ing to save him. All day long He will stretch out 
His hands to him ; all day long call after him in 
tones of love and compassion, ‘ Son, give me thy 
heart !’ and it will not matter how low he may fall, 
nor how far away he may wander into the desert of 
sin and shame, the moment he hearkens to that 
voice and turns from himself to God, he will be in 
the fold of safety. It is a good thing for Granger 
that he is feeling his own helplessness, and begin- 
ning to look for help from above. He may not find 
it now, because he may not be ready to give his 
heart to God ; but if, trusting in his own strength, 
he should fall again, God will not forsake him, but 
still go after him, and it may be find him so weak,* 
and helpless, and despairing, that he will no longer 
hold back, but throw himself into the loving arms 
of his divine Saviour. Then will be born in him 
a new life from above ; and if he live this life he 
shall never fall again ; for it is a heavenly life. Hot 
a mere life of faith and feeling, but of love to God 
and good will to man, that continually shows itself 
in a keeping of the commandments in the spirit as 
well as in the letter.” 


AS BY FIRE. 


153 


“It is your belief, then,” said I, “that until Mr. 
Granger becomes a religious man there is very little- 
hope for him ?” 

“ Very little, I fear.” 

“ He must unite himself with the church ?” 

“ It would be better for him. But joining the 
church will not make him a religious man. That 
is the effect of an internal change, not of an external 
relation. There must be a new spiritual birth before 
there can be a new man. ‘ Marvel not that I said 
unto thee. Ye must be born again.’ ” • 

“ Ah ! if we knew just what that meant,” I said. 

“ That which is born of the flesh is flesh,’’ said 
Mr. Stannard. “ Let us rise higher in our thought. 
The new birth is in the soul. It has been down 
into the world, where it has gone by way of the 
senses, and has lived the life of the world, which is 
a selfish life, and evil because selfish. The more 
intense this life, the more opposite to the life of 
Heaven has it become. Now, unless a new life be 
born in the soul, it can never come into Heaven, 
which is a state of love to the Lord and the neigh- 
bor. How this life is born is the great and import- 
ant question. Let me make it as clear to your un- 
derstanding as lies in my power. This new birth 
is effected by means of Divine truth cast into the 
mind as a seed, and the new spiritual birth has its 
beginning in the very moment that a man endeavors 
earnestly and by the help of God to obey this truth. 
For to do is to live. If the doing is in obedience to 


154 


SAVED 


Divine truth, which teaches that a man shall not 
only love God, but cease to do evil, then the new 
man, a weak and almost helpless infant as yet, be- 
gins really to live and grow ; and the Divine sphere 
is round about it, and all the powers of Heaven are 
arrayed for its protection. It is absolutely safe, this 
new-born child, so long as it takes the sincere milk 
of the Word, and lives thereby. But in danger the 
moment it turns itself away therefrom, and attempts 
to feed on the husks that can only sustain the lower 
life of selfishness and sin. The spiritual man can- 
not subsist on these. It must have heavenly food 
or it will die.” 

“ Then it is not the instantaneous washing and 
purifying of the old natural man, but the birth of 
a new spiritual man, which must live and grow until 
it attain the full stature, as the apostle says, of a man 
in Christ Jesus?” 

“ The natural man is for this world. The spirit- 
ual man for Heaven. We must come into the 
Kingdom of Heaven as little children, not as full- 
grown spiritual men. He called a little child and 
set him in the midst of them, and said, ‘ Verily I 
say unto you, except ye be converted, and become 
as little children, ye shall not enter into the King- 
dom of Heaven.’ First a weak child, with the 
angels that do always behold the face of my Father 
close about Him ; afterwards a strong spiritual man, 
ruling in righteousness over all the lower things 
of natural life, and bringing them into heavenly 


AS BY FIRE. 


155 


order — establishing the kingdom of God in the 
natural man, and doing the will of God in the earth 
as it is done in Heaven.” 

“ Taking this view,” I said, “ is not the confident 
state of mind we so often see in young converts one 
of false security, and attended with great danger ? 
We hear them speak with the assurance of strong 
men.” 

“ While yet only babes in Christ. Yes, this state 
is one of false security, and, therefore, its dangers 
are great. Ho wonder that so many stumble — that 
so few keep to their first love. They use strong 
meat instead of milk ; try to lift themselves to the 
stature of full-grown men, and to walk with long 
strides; are bold and confident. But being only 
little children, they fall ; having no root themselves, 
they endure but for a while, and when tribulations 
and persecutions arise because of the Word, by and 
by they are oflfended.” 




CHAPTER XL 


A HEADLONG PLUNGE. 

I HAD left my office a little earlier than usual in 
the afternoon, and was on my way homeward, 
when, on turning the corner of a street, I saw Mr. 
Granger just in advance of me. He was walking 
slowly, with his head bent slightly forward. Quick- 
ening my pace, I soon joined him. As I laid my 
hand on his arm and spoke, he gave a start, and 
when I looked into his face I saw the color rising. 
There was something in his eyes that gave me a 
feeling of uneasiness. His manner was more re- 
pressed than cordial. 

We walked together for the space of a few blocks, 
and then our ways parted. We had not, in our 
efforts to talk, touched upon any subject in which 
we found a mutual interest; and therefore our brief 
intercourse had been marked by constraint. What 
followed our separation I learned long afterwards, 
and from the lips of Mr. Granger himself. I give 
the story in his own words : 

“ I had been fighting the old appetite desperate- 
ly,” said he ; “ fighting it for weeks, and being often 
on the very eve of defeat and surrender. But the 
awful condition into which I would be cast if I fell 
into the enemy’s power held me to my post. I saw 
15G 


AS BY FIRE. 


157 


my liome desolated, my wife broken-hearted, my 
children beggared — and I so loved them! I saw 
myself cast down again, and to a lower depth of 
misery and degradation than any into which I had 
yet fallen. The horror that was before me was ap- 
palling, and all the while I felt the peril increas- 
ing — my enemy growing stronger, and my power of 
resistance weaker. 

“ And now it seemed as if all hell were against 
me. I could not look this way or that — go here nor 
there, but temptation met me face to face. Men 
who knew nothing of my past history, and some 
who knew it too well, invited me to drink. At din- 
ners, at social gatherings, at private interviews with 
clients, at friendly meetings on the streets and in 
offices and stores, the glass was offered or the invi- 
tation to drink given. I wearied of saying no, and 
began to feel ashamed of the weakness that so 
often brought on me a look of surprise when I 
pushed the extended cup aside. In the street I 
could not walk for half a square without encounter- 
ing a saloon which gave to appetite a reminder 
through the sense of sight or smell. You may 
think it strange, but I have gone out of my way 
again and again, in order to avoid passing a certain 
drinking saloon, the very sight of which, more than 
any other, quickened my desire for liquor. 

“Stronger and stronger became the pressure of 
the downward current, and my sense of danger 
greater. I looked this way and that for help, but 


158 


SAVED 


saw no way of escape. All faith in my own man- 
hood was fast leaving me, and I knew that the time 
must come when some stronger sweep of the waters 
would hear me away. 

“ It was this feeling that drew me to church some- 
times. But I went, always, under a kind of protest, 
and while there too often set my thought against 
what I heard, instead of opening my mind to the 
sacred influences of the place. I shall never forget 
the last Sunday on which I attended worship — I tried 
to stay away, and made many excuses to myself for 
remaining at home. But none of them prevailed. 
As I entered , the church doors on that morning, I 
was conscious of a new feeling. As if I had stepped 
from an arena where I had been fighting for my 
life, into a place of rest and safety. My heart was 
touched and opened. The lessons from the Bible 
particularly impressed me ; and many of the divine 
words seemed as if spoken for my assurance. I felt, 
as I had never felt before, that by the help of God 
I might stand fast ; and I resolved to go to Him and 
ask Him for aid and succor. 

“ I went out- in the afternoon, saying to my wife 
that I was going to see Mr. Stannard. I wanted to 
have a talk with this good man about religion and 
the church, for I had great confidence in him. But 
I did not do as I intended ; and here was my fatal 
error. When only a short distance from his house, 
I met a couple of friends riding out, and weakly 
yielded to their solicitations to go with them for a 


AS BY FIRE. 


159 


drive in the Park. As I entered the carriage I was 
sensible of an opposite impression to that which I 
had felt in the morning. Then it seemed to me as 
if I had passed from strife and peril into a place of 
safety ; now, from a sphere of safety into one of dan- 
ger. But it was too late for me to recede. The car- 
riage was in motion again and I once more adrift 
on a current too strong for my steadily lessening 
powers of resistance. 

“ A drive for an hour in the Park with pleasant 
friends, and then an invitation to drink at one of 
the restaurants. I took only ginger ale; but the 
smell of their stronger liquors was in my nostrils, 
and I felt an almost irrepressible desire to taste them. 
The very act of drinking with these friends, though 
what I took might only be a harmless beverage, had 
an evil influence on me. 

“ I would see Mr. Stannard in the evening, I 
thought, as I entered the carriage ; but when even- 
ing came, my state of mind had undergone so com- 
plete a change, that the very thought of religious 
things was distasteful. For the two or three days 
that folloAved, it seemed as if I could not turn to the 
right hand nor to the left without temptation. It 
was not greater than usual, perhaps; only I was 
weaker and more open to assault. The day at whose 
close I met you, as I was on my way homeward, had 
been marked not only by many incidents of warn- 
ing, but by an unwonted number of solicitations. I 
was weary and exhausted from incessant conflict ; 


160 


SAVED 


and what was worse, my mind was losing its balance. 
I could not hold it to the high considerations of 
honor, and duty, and love, which had hitherto in- 
fluenced me. A cloud came down over it. Clear- 
seeing was gone. I felt only an irresistible craving. 
It was as if an evil spirit had taken possession of per- 
ception and feeling, and held them to a single 
thought and desire ; the thought of liquor and the 
desire to drink. Was I not for the time insane and 
irresponsible ? Could I help the fatal plunge I made ? 

“ You remember our brief meeting. Scarcely had 
we parted when a client for whom I was conducting 
an important suit, laid his hand on me, saying: 
‘ Ah ! This is fortunate. Granger. I missed you at 
your office. Some new facts, of great importance 
in our case, have come into my possession, and I 
wished you to have them with as little delay as pos- 
sible.’ He drew his arm in mine and we walked 
for a short distance, trying to converse. But the 
noise and confusion of the street interrupted us. 
As we were passing a drinking saloon, he said: 
‘ Come ; we’ll get a quiet corner in here, and talk 
this matter over.’ I went with him passively. We 
found a quiet corner. ‘ What will you have ?’ he 
said. I made a feeble effort to get to my lips the 
words, ‘Nothing for me,’ but failed, and in their 
stead, as if my organs of speech were controlled by 
another, answered, ‘ Not particular. Anything you 
please.’ Beer was set before me, and I drank. You 
know the rest.” 


AS BY FIRE. 


161 


His client did not find liim at his office on the 
next morning, nor in the court-room when the trial 
of his case, which had been opened on the previous 
day, was continued. The new facts which had been 
given to Granger were not put in evidence, and the 
associate counsel had, in his absence, to meet the 
issue without them. The result proved disastrous — 
the case was lost. But that was of small considera- 
tion in comparison with the loss of the man who 
had been tempted at the moment when the power to 
resist was almost gone. 

How rapid the fall which came. It was an almost 
headlong plunge. The whole man seemed to give 
way. For over two weeks it was a perpetual de- 
bauch with drink, and the end came only when the 
over-strained nerves and organs gave way, and he 
was prostrated by sickness. His recovery was fol- 
lowed by a speedy relapse into intemperance. As 
far as could be seen, there was no longer any effort 
on his part to resist the demon of appetite, or to strug- 
gle against the stream that was bearing him down. 
In every conflict with this demon he had in the end 
been beaten, and with each new rally there had been 
loss of strength. What hope of victory in any new 
battle ? He felt that there was none, and weakly 
abandoned himself to his fate. 

Alas for the swift descent! Friends fell av/ay 
from him. Clients removed their cases from his 
hands. Business forsook his office. More than half 
his time was spent in drinking-saloons, or in sleep- 


SAVED 


162 

ing off the effects of drunkenness. Scarcely six 
months had elapsed when, in passing his residence 
on Spruce Street one day, I saw a hill on the door. 
The house was for -rent. In the following week he 
moved away, his family dropping again out of the 
old circles. 

Occasionally, after this, I met him on the street. 
The change in his appearance was sad to witness. 
Excessive drinking had swollen and distorted his 
face, robbing it of its fine intelligence. All the fire 
had gone out of his eyes. Meeting him on one oc- 
casion, I took his hand and said : “ Granger, my 
dear man, this is all wrong. You will kill your- 
self.” 

A strange gleam shot across his face, and there 
was a brief disturbance in his manner. Then, with 
a short laugh, he replied : “All right. The sooner 
it’s over the better.” 

“No, no. It’s all wrong. Come round to my 
oifice. I want to talk to you.” 

“ No, thank you. It won’t be of any use ; and 
besides, I’ve an engagement.” 

“ It’s never too late to mend,” I urged. “ Never 
too late to stop — ” 

“You don’t know anything about it,” he said, 
with some impatience of manner, interrupting me. 
“ When the devil of drink gets yoii fairly iii his 
clutches, there’s small chance left. Good-bye, and 
God bless you !” There was a break in his voice in 
the closing sentence. 


[AS BY FIRE, 


163 


Turning from me abruptly, lie walked away. I 
beard, not long afterwards, that in order to keep ber 
two younger sisters at scbool, bis oldest daughter, 
Amy, a beautiful young girl, wbo made ber appear- 
ance in society about a year before, bad assumed 
tbe duties of a teacher in the seminary where they 
were being educated, and that Mrs. Granger was 
trying to get music scholars. 

Next it was said that Granger had become abusive 
to his family. I could not believe this, for I knew 
something of the natural tenderness of his heart, 
and the strength of his old love for his wife and 
children. Even while under the influence of drink, 
I did not believe that he would be anything but 
personally kind to them. How great, therefore, was 
my surprise and sorrow, when, a few months later, 
the fact became known that his wife had left him 
on account of ill treatment, and was living with her 
three daughters in the family of a relative. 

Granger still had his law ofiice, and was occasion- 
ally in court as counsel in some petty larceny or 
assault and battery case, picking up a fee here and 
there, and managing to get money enough to supply 
the demands of his insatiate and steadily increasing 
appetite. But the time came when even this poor 
resource failed. When few, if any, were found will- 
ing to trust even the most trifling case to a man who 
might stand up in court on the day of trial so much 
intoxicated as to be unable to tell on which side of 
the case he was pleading. 


164 


[ SAVED 


In less than two years from the date of his last 
relapse into drunkenness, Granger had fallen so low 
that to get money for drink he would stoop to any 
meanness or falsehood. All shame, all sense of 
honor, all regard for the truth, had died out of him. 
He had become a miserable beggar, making his 
daily round among the law offices and through the 
court-rooms, soliciting the loan of a trifle here and 
a trifle there from old friends and acquaintances, and 
taking rebuffs, curses, stern rebukes and pitiful re- 
monstrances with but few signs of feeling. Promises 
of amendment he would make without limit. If 
the asked-for loan were withheld under the plea 
that he would spend it for drink, he would not hesi- 
tate about making the most solemn asseveration that 
he had taken no liquor for days, and only wanted 
to get something to eat, not having tasted food for 
twenty-four or thirty-six hours, as this or that period 
happened to come to his lips. One lie with 
him was as good as another, so that it served his 
purpose. And there had been a time when he would 
have felt his high sense of personal honor tarnished 
by even a small prevarication ! So had the robber 
demon of drink despoiled the man ! And not of 
honor alone ; every moral sense had been stolen 
away, drugged into sleep, or wrested from him. 

I saw a crowd in the street one day, and crossed 
to see what it meant. As I came near, I observed 
a slender girl, who had been drawn into the group 
of men and women, moving back hastily, as if 



“ I saw Alexander Granger sitting on the pavement and leaning back against 
a door-step so drunk that he could scarcely hold his head up.”— Paye 161. 



AS BY FIBE. 


167 


shocked by what she had witnessed in the centre of 
the crowd. A white, almost terror-stricken face 
met my view as she turned. I was impressed by 
something familiar in its contour and expression. I 
saw it only for an instant, for the young girl fled 
past me as one afirighted and went hurrying down 
the street. For a moment or two I stood looking 
after her swiftly-retreating form, wondering where 
I had seen her. All doubts were settled when, on 
pressing forward, I saw Alexander Granger sitting 
on the pavement and leaning back against a door- 
step, so drunk that he could scarcely hold his head 
up ; while a policeman was endeavoring to lift him 
to his feet. The girl was his daughter, Amy. 

A few hours afterwards, as I stood on the steps of 
my own residence, about to enter, the door was 
drawn open from within and I met the face of 
Granger’s daughter again. The whiteness had not 
yet gone out of it. She gave a little start at seeing 
me. 

“Miss Granger, I believe,” said I, with kind 
familiarity in my voice, extending my hand at the 
same time. I felt a tremor in the small, soft palm 
that was laid in mine for an instant and then with- 
drawn. Tears were coming in the poor girl’s eyes, 
and I saw that her lips were quivering. I stepped 
aside that she might pass, and in a moment she was 
gone. 

Inside the door my own precious daughter, just 
Amy’s age, met me, and laid her loving kisses on 
11 


168 


SAVED 


my lips. I could not trust myself to speak because 
of the tearful pity that was in my heart for the 
worse than fatherless girl who had just gone oyer 
the threshold of my happy home. 

“What did Amy Granger want?” I asked, as, 
with an arm about my daughter, we went from the 
hall into the parlor. 

“ She’s trying to get a place in the Mint, and she 
called to ask mother about it, and to see if you 
wouldn’t sign her application.” 

“ Why, of course I will. Did she leave it ?” 

“ Yes. And she asked mother to ask you if you 
didn’t know somebody else who would help her by 
signing it.” 

“Poor child!” I said, pityingly. “To be so 
robbed and wronged I Of course I’ll do all in my 
power to help her. I’ll see the Director of the Mint 
myself, and if there’s a place vacant. I’ll not leave a 
stone unturned but she shall have it.” 

“ There’s something so sweet about her,” said my 
daughter. “ So refined and modest, and gentle. Oh! 
it must be very hard. What an awful thing this 
drunkenness is ! Why, father, dear,” and the sweet 
girl drew her arms about my neck and laid her 
cheek against mine, “ I should not have a. moment’s 
peace if you drank wine or beer every day as some 
men do.” 

“ You’d have cause for trouble, my darling, if 
that were so,” I replied, “ for no man who uses them 
can be regarded as safe. I know of a dozen ruined 


AS BY FIRE. 


169 


homes that were once as secure and as happy as 
ours. It was drink that desolated them. And I 
know of many more that are in danger, and towards 
which ruin is walking with slow but steady steps.” 

She held her arms more tightly about my neck. 
When she lifted her cheek from mine her eyes were 
wet with tears. 

My efforts to secure a situation in the Mint for 
Miss Granger were not successful, another applicant 
for the vacant j)lace getting the appointment. But 
my interest and that of my family were thoroughly 
awakened in behalf of the girl, who not only de- 
sired independence for herself, but an opportunity 
to help her mother and younger sisters. The best 
that could be done for her in the beginning was to 
secure the position of attendant in a photograph gal- 
lery at four dollars a week. It was accepted with 
thankfulness. Mrs. Granger, who had commenced 
giving lessons in music even before her separation 
from her husband, continued in the profession of 
teacher, and had scholars enough to give her a mod- 
erate income and keep her above absolute depend- 
ence on the relatives who had so kindly offered her 
a home in her sore extremity. 

It was three or four months after we had succeeded 
in getting a place for Amy Granger, that, on coming 
home one day, I found her mother waiting to see 
me. I did not know her on first coming into the 
parlor, a year or two had so changed her, and when, 
on my entrance, she arose and introduced herself, I 


SAVED 


170 

could scarcely believe it possible that the wife of 
Alexander Granger was before me. 

“ I’ve called to see you on account of my daugh- 
ter,” she said, after being seated again. Her manner 
was much embarrassed ; and she was evidently try- 
ing to hide the distress from which she was sufiering. 

“ What about Amy ?” I asked. 

“ You were very kind in getting her into that 
photograph gallery,” she answered, “ and we were all 
so grateful.” 

“ She hasn’t lost her situation, I hope ?” 

Yes, she had lost it; I saw this in the mother’s 
face. 

“ How came it ?” I asked. “ Didn’t she give sat- 
isfaction ?” 

“ Oh ! yes, sir. It was all right so far as that 
went ; and they had increased her pay to five dollars 
a week. But — ” I saw the tears flooding her eyes 
as the quaver in her voice checked her speech. 
“ Amy couldn’t come and tell you herself,” she re- 
sumed, as she recovered her self-possession. “ It 
was too hard for the poor child. But she wanted 
me to see you.” 

“ Tell me all about it,” I said, kindly. “ I’m sure 
it was no fault of hers, poor child !” 

“ Indeed it was not, Mr. Lyon. It made her sick. 
She was in bed for two or three days ; and she looks 
as if she’d come out of a long spell of sickness.” 

“ She mustn’t take it so to heart,” I replied. “ No 
doubt it can ail be made right again.” 


AS BY FIRE. 171 

“Oh! no, sir. She can’t go back there any- 
more.” 

“Why not, Mrs. Granger?” 

“Because — because — ” her voice breaking and 
quivering again. Then she recovered herself and 
said, with firmer speech : “ It’s on account of her 
father.” 

“ It can’t be possible,” I spoke with some indigna- 
tion, “that his misdeeds should stand in the way of 
her honest efforts at self-support ! No one could be 
so cruelly unjust toward her as that.” 

Then the truth came out. Let me give the story 
as it came to me then, and follow out the sequel as it 
came to me afterwards. 




CHAPTER XII. 


IN PRISON. 



IHE stock of seeing her father in the condition 


-J- we have described, hurt deeply the sensitive 
nature of Amy Granger. All affection for him, de- 
based and degraded as he was, had not died in her 
heart. Memory held too many sweet pictures of the 
old, dear home which she had lost, and of the tender 
and loving father who had once been the light and 
joy of that home. She could never walk the street 
afterwards without a nervous fear of again encounter- 
ing him. From this she was spared for several 
months after obtaining the place of an attendant in 
the rooms of a photographer. 

But one morning, just as she was at the entrance of 
these rooms, she met her father face to face. He had 
slept in a station-house, and had just been sent forth, 
exhausted from want of food, and with every nerve 
unstrung for lack of stimulants, wretched in feeling 
and loathesome in appearance. The shocked and 
half-frightened girl glided swiftly past him, and fled 
trembling up the stairway leading to the gallery in 
which she was employed, hoping that he had not 
recognized her. But in this she was mistaken. 
Scarcely had she reached the second floor ere she 
heard him following her up the stairs, shuffling and 


172 


A8 BY FIRE. 


173 


stumbling by tbe way. Retreating to the back part 
of the room, she stood breathless and frightened, 
until the awfully marred and distorted face of her 
father looked in upon her from the door. The sight 
almost broke her heart. But in an instant all thought 
of herself was forgotten. The love which had been 
trampled upon, bruised and broken, and wounded 
almost to the death, lifted itself into the agony of a 
new life, and threw out its arms wildly. In this 
poor dismantled wreck of humanity, storm-beaten, 
helpless and deserted, she saw the father on whose 
breast she had once lain in sweet confidence. All the 
happy past came back in a moment; pity and tender- 
ness flooded her soul. Starting forward, she laid her 
hands on him, saying in tones of the deepest com- 
passion : “ Oh, father ! father !” 

"Weak, nerveless, helpless as a sick child. Granger 
caught hold of his daughter with a half-despairing 
eagerness, and held on to her as a drowning man to 
some new and unlooked-for means of succor. 

“ Yes, it’s your poor father, Amy,” he said, in a 
deep, rattling voice, scarcely a tone of which she 
recognized. “All that’s left of him.” 

He shivered ; for the morning was cold, and his 
garments were scant and thin. What could she do 
or say? Before her bewildered thoughts could un- 
tangle themselves, he gave the prompting words. 

“ I haven’t had anything to eat since yesterday, 
Amy.” His voice shaking as he spoke. 

The child’s pocket-book was in her hand ere the 


174 


SAVED 


sentence was finished. All it contained was fifty 
cents. As she took the money out, Granger caught 
it from her fingers, saying: “Oh, thank you dear! 
You were always such a good girl.” 

The little crumpled bit of paper was scarcely in 
the man’s possession ere he turned away and went 
stumbling down the stairs, his daughter listening in 
painful suspense, every moment expecting to hear 
him fall. But he reached the street in safety, and 
made his way to the nearest bar-room he could find. 

When Amy, who had kept all this from her 
mother, reached the gallery next morning, she found 
her father already there and awaiting her arrival. 
His appearance was, if possible, more wretched and 
disgusting than on the day before. He was sitting 
near a table on which were a number of fancy photo- 
graphs, stereoscopic views and small card-cases and 
frames. The sight of him sent the color out of his 
daughter’s face, and the strength out of her limbs. 

“ Oh, father ! father!” she said, speaking in a low 
voice, as she came up to where he was sitting. “ It’s 
hard for me to say it, hut you mustn’t come here any 
more. I shall lose my place if you do.” 

She saw something like a frightened look in his 
eyes as he got up hastily. 

“ I’ll go, then. I’ll go right away,” he answered, 
in an abject manner. “ But just give me a little 
something with which to get my breakfast. I haven’t 
had a mouthful since yesterday.” 

She gave him the trifle of change that was in her 


AS BY FIRE. 


175 


pocket-book, which he clutched with the same trem- 
bling eagerness he had shown on the day before, and 
as hurriedly made his way to the street. The only 
witness of this scene and that of the preceding morn- 
ing, was an errand boy. 

“ Is that man your father. Miss Granger ?” asked 
the lad, as Amy turned from the door. 

She could not answer him. 

“ ’Cause, if he is, you’d better not let him come 
here any more. There’ll be trouble for you if he 
does. I thought ’twas your father, and so kept mum 
until I could speak to you.” 

“ What do you mean?” asked Amy, as she turned 
a scared face on the boy. 

“ I don’t like to tell you, miss. But he stole one of 
them small morocco cases. I saw him slip it into his 
pocket.” 

The poor girl dropped into a chair, white as a 
sheet. Everything grew dark about her, and it was 
only by a strong effort of the will that she kept from 
losing her consciousness and falling to the floor. 

“ You are not well, dear,” said Amy’s mother, as 
she looked into the face of her daughter on the 
morning after Granger’s first visit to the photograph 
gallery. 

“ My head aches a little,” was the evasive answer. 

Mrs. Granger was sitting in the room about an 
hour after Amy left home, when she heard some one 
come in and ascend the stairs. The footfalls were so 
light as scarcely to give a sound. She waited, lis- 


176 


8AVED 


tening ; but no one came to her door. Listening 
still, she perceived a faint rustling of garments as of 
some one passing up to the rooms above. Then the 
door of Amy’s room was opened and closed almost 
noiselessly ; and all was still again. What did this 
mean? She had a vague sense of mystery and fear. 
For several minutes she sat with ear bent, and heart 
beating heavily. 

“ Who came in just now and went up stairs ?” she 
asked of one of her younger daughters who entered 
the room where she was sitting. 

“ I heard no one,” answered the child. 

“ Go and see if Amy has come home.” 

The child did as requested, but came back in a 
few moments, with a frightened look in her eyes, 
and said: “Oh, mamma! Amy’s lying on her bed; 
and she won’t speak to me.” 

Mrs. Granger found her 'daughter as the child 
had said. Her face was hidden. She looked as if she 
had fallen across the bed in utter prostration of 
strength. 

“ Why, Amy, dear 1 What’s the matter ? Are you 
sick?” 

There was no movement or reply. 

Mrs. Granger bent over her daughter and tried to 
lift her face so that she could look into it ; but Amy’s 
only response was a slight resistance and continued 
hiding of her face. 

“ Amy, my child ! Why don’t you speak to me ? 
Has anything happened ?” The alarmed and anx- 


AS BY FIRE. 


177 


ious motlier pressed her questions rapidly ; hut no 
reply coming, she drew her arm beneath the head 
of her daughter and lifted and turned it so that she 
could look into the hitherto hidden face. It was 
pale and rigid, with signs of intense suffering about 
the closely-shut mouth. A long time passed before 
Mrs. Granger could gather from the unhappy girl 
the story of her father’s visits to the gallery, and the 
shame and disgrace which they had brought upon 
her. 

Many days passed ere Amy was able to rise out 
of the deep prostration of mind and body into which 
she had been thrown, and to turn her thoughts to 
the work and duty that were still before her. She 
could not go back to the photograph rooms. That 
question did not have a moment’s debate, either with 
herself or her mother. It was to get my advice and 
help in this new and most distressing state of affairs 
that Mrs. Granger had called upon me, as mentioned 
in the preceding chapter. My sympathies were 
strongly excited, and I assured her that I would do 
all in my power to assist her daughter in getting 
another place. 

Meanwhile the proprietor of the photograph gal- 
lery, who had met Amy on the stairs as she was 
hurrying away and noticed the pallor and the wild 
look in her face, had made inquiry of the lad as to 
the meaning of her disturbed condition. On learn- 
ing the truth, he became greatly incensed towards 
Granger — ^not so much because of the petty theft 


178 


SAVED 


which had been committed, as on account of the 
humiliation and sutfering which he had brought 
upon his innocent daughter. Under the heat of his 
sudden indignation he started out, and by the aid of 
a policeman, succeeded in finding the miserable man 
in one of the saloons not far distant. On searching 
him the stolen article was discovered on his person. 
His arrest and commitment by an alderman quickly 
followed. As no one willing to go bail for him 
could be found, he was sent to the county jail, where 
he had been lying for two or three days when the 
fact of his imprisonment first became known to me 
through Mr. Stannard, a gentleman to whom brief 
reference has already been made. 

“ Have you heard about poor Granger ?” he said, 
as we met one morning on the street. 

“ What about him ?” I asked. 

“ He’s in Moyamensing.” 

“ For what?” 

“ Theft. He stole some trifle from a photograph 
gallery, and was arrested and sent to prison.” 

“ Better there than living a life of drunken vaga- 
bondism on the street,” I replied. 

“ I heard through the prison agent that he was 
seized with mania soon after his commitment, and 
had a hard struggle for his life. But he came 
through after suffering the tortures of hell, greatly 
prostrated in mind and body.” 

“ Poor wretch ! It would have been better had 
he not come through,” I made answer, with less of 


AS BY FIRE. 


179 


feeling in my voice than was really in my heart. 
“A curse to himself and to all who, unhappily, 
have any relationship with him, why should he con- 
tinue to cumber the ground ?” 

I spoke more bitterly than I felt, for I had old 
remembrances of this man which drew upon my 
sympathies, and softened my heart towards him. 
There came to me, even as I spoke, a strong and 
pitiful contrast between what he had been in the 
days of his proud and honorable manhood, and what 
he was now, debased, ruined, homeless, sick and in 
prison. 

“ God knows best. With Him are the issues of 
life.” Mr. Stannard drew his arm in mine as he 
spoke. “And now, friend Lyon,” he continued, 
“ as, in God’s providence, this man and his dreadful 
condition have been brought so clearly before us, 
may we not regard the fact as an indication that it 
is our duty to make another effort to save him ? He 
has reached a lower deep than any to which he had 
hitherto fallen. May not the awful sense of loss and 
degradation which he must feel, quicken into life a 
new and more intense desire to get free from the 
horrible pit into which appetite has cast him ? And 
may not He who alone is able to save, find now an 
entrance which has been hitherto closed against 
Him ?” 

I was near my ofiice when I met Mr. Stannard. 
As he drew his arm in mine we moved onward and 
were soon at the door. 


180 


SAVED 


“ Come in. I shall be glad to talk with you about 
Granger. If there is any hope of saving him, I 
am ready to do all that lies in my power.” 

We sat down together and gave his case our most 
earnest consideration. As for myself, I saw little if 
anything to encourage a new effort to rescue this 
fallen man. I had read and thought a great deal 
about the evil of drunkenness in the last year or two, 
and was satisfied that, in cases of what medical men 
define as confirmed alcoholism, a permanent cure is 
rarely if ever effected. It was a disease that might 
be arrested for a time through the complete removal 
of exciting causes; but one which, if predisposing 
causes were once fairly established, could never be 
radically cured. 

“ If there were no bar-rooms and no social drink- 
ing customs,” I said, as we talked, “ we might hope 
to reform a case like this. But one might as well 
send a man who had just recovered from intermittent 
fever back again into the miasmatic region from 
which he had escaped, as a reformed drunkard into 
the business and social world of to-day. There 
would be small hope of escape for either of them.” 

Mr. Stannard drew a deep sigh, but did not an- 
swer. 

I continued : “ What makes this case of Granger’s 
so discouraging, is the fact that every possible agency 
of reform has already been tried. You know that he 
was in the New York Inebriate Asylum for several 
months.” 


AS BY FIRE. 


181 


“Yes, I am aware of that.” 

“ He came home vastly improved ; and I had great 
hopes of him for awhile. But old associations and 
old influences set themselves against him from the 
very day of his return home. It was a continual 
pressure ; a continual dropping ; a continual allure- 
ment. After awhile the old appetite, which had not 
been extinguished, began to show signs of life. You 
know the rest. He was not cured. And, from all I 
can learn of this disease of drunkenness, no one is 
ever so thoroughly cured as not to be in perpetual 
danger of relapse. We may take Granger out of 
prison, and set him on his feet again ; but will he 
stand ? Nay, will he not surely fall ? If I could 
only see a reasonable hope. But to my mind there 
is none.” 

“ There is always hope in God,” said Mr. Stannard, 
his voice low but steady and assured. 

My heart did not give a quick response to his 
words. 

“No man ever falls so low that Christ cannot lift 
him up and save him,” he added. 

“ I believe that,” was my answer. “ But how does 
He save ? How, for instance, can He save a man 
like Granger ? How can His Divine power reach 
him, and lift him free from the curse of the terrible 
appetite which has enslaved him? Men look to 
God, and pray to Him, and yet are not saved. Gran- • 
ger went to church for awhile, and tried to get a 
higher strength, but it did not come. Why ? Did 


182 


SAVED 


God hold himself away from him because faith was 
halting and blind ? Did He make the measure of 
this poor man’s feeble mental effort the measure of 
His mercy ? I cannot believe it.” 

“ And you must not,” Mr, Stannard said, gently, 
“ He knoweth our frame, and remembereth that we 
are dust. Are not His words explicit — ‘ Him that 
cometh unto me I will in no wise cast out.’ Run- 
ning through all the Divine Word, is there not a 
perpetual invitation to look to Him and come to 
Him for refuge,. for safety, for strength, and for sal- 
vation ?” 

“ But how is a man to come, Mr. Stannard ?” 

“We begin to come the moment we repent of our 
sins and look to the Lord for strength to resist and 
put them away. We come nearer when we obey 
His command, ‘ Cease to do evil.’ Then, and only 
then, do we put it into the Lord’s power to save us. 

‘ His name shall be called Jesus, for He shall save 
His people from their sins.’ But if the people will 
not quit the evil of their doing, how can He save 
them from the love of evil doing — which is the true 
salvation ? ‘ Behold I stand at the door and knock. 

If any man hear my voice and open the door, I will 
come in to him.’ Now what is it that shuts the door 
against God ? Is it not sin ; the love of self and 
the world ; the indulgence of evil passions and 
appetites ? He cannot dwell in a heart where these 
abide. They must be cast out, a? id then God’s temple 
in the human soul is prepared for His entrance.” 


AS BY FIRE. 183 

“ But,” I said, “ wlio can cast them out but God ? 
Is not this the doctrine of the church ?” 

“ None but a Divine power,” Mr. Stannard an- 
swered, “ can remove the love of sinning. But first 
man of himself must open the door which evil-doing 
has barred against God.” 

“ How can this he done ?” 

“ There is only one way. He must cease to do evil 
because it is a sin against God. Beyond this he has 
no power over his corrupt nature. He cannot 
change his inner vileness into beauty, cannot make 
himself pure, cannot by good deeds enter the king- 
dom of God. Over the external things of thought 
and act he has power, but the Lord alone can change 
his inner affection — take away the heart of stone and 
give the heart of flesh. But, ere this can he done, 
man must not only repent of his evil deeds because 
they are sins, but actually cease from doing them. 
In the moment that he does this from a religious 
principle — that is because to do evil is contrary to 
the Divine Law, and therefore a sin against God — 
and looks to the Lord to deliver and save him, in that 
moment he opens the door of his heart for the Lord 
to enter, and the Lord, who has been knocking there 
by His Divine Word and commandments, will surely 
come in. And so long as he shuns evils as sins in 
the external of his life, is just, and merciful, and 
humble, God will abide with him and in him, and he 
shall walk as safely in the midst of temptation as the 
three Hebrew children in the fiery furnace, because 
12 


184 


SAVED 


the Son of God is with him as He was with 
them.” 

“ Not of faith alone, nor of works, nor of merit,” 
I said. 

“ No, but of obedience. And in the degree that 
obedience becomes perfected, will love become per- 
fected. . In the degree that a man shuns in thought 
and act the evils that in any way hurt his neighbor 
or do dishonor to God, in that degree will the Lord 
remove from his heart the desire to do them, and 
give the affection of good in their place.” 

“ Going back now to Mr. Granger,” I said, “ why, 
when he put away the evil of drinking for so long 
a time, was not the desire for this sinful indulgence 
taken away? Did he not open the door for the 
Lord to come in ?” 

“We open the door at which the Lord stands 
knocking when we see and acknowledge the evils 
in our lives that hold the door bolted and barred 
against Him, and cease to do them because they are 
sins.” 

“ Because tkey are sins ?” 

“ Yes. If we cease to do evil from any other con- 
sideration, we do not open the door.” 

“ I am not sure that I get your meaning,” said I. 

“ Take the case of Granger. Why did he shun 
the evil of drinking?” 

“ Because he saw that it was ruining him.” 

“ That it was a sin against himself rather than 
against God,” said Mr. Stannard. 


AS BY FIRE. 


185 


“ What is sin against God ?” I asked. 

“Any and everything that man does in opposition 
to Divine order.” 

“ The answer is too general,” I said. 

“ The laws of this order as applied to man are 
very simple and direct,” he returned. “ Thou shalt 
love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and thy 
neighbor as thyself. Now, in Mr. Granger’s case, 
did he make an effort to control his appetite for 
drink because its indulgence was a sin against the 
true order of his life and turned him away from all 
just regard for God and his neighbor — thus a sin 
against God Himself — or, did his thought reach 
only to himself and to his worldly loss or gain ?” 

“ I scarcely think his motive went as far as you 
suggest.” 

“ If it did not, how was God to save him ? If it 
was not the sin of intemperance that troubled him, 
hut only the consequences of that sin, there could 
he no true repentance and humiliation before God. 
And here let me say, Mr. Lyon, that no man can be 
saved from any particular evil, as, for instance, that 
of drunkenness, unless at the same time he resist 
and endeavor to put away all other sins against God. 
The whole man must be reformed and regenerated. 
Everything forbidden in the Word of God must 
be put away through the Divine strength given 
to all who earnestly try to keep the command- 
ments.” 

“I see your meaning more clearly,” I replied. 


186 


SAVED 


“ There must be a new and better life in the whole 
man.” , 

“ If not how can God abide with him and in 
him ?” 

“Coming hack again to the case of Granger,” 
said I, “ and regarding it from your standpoint, is 
there any possibility of a permanent reform ?” 

“Yes.” 

“ You speak confidently.” 

“ Because I have faith in the Great Physician of 
souls. There is a Divine healing power which all 
men may have if they will.” 

“ Nothing but a Divine power can cure him. Of 
that I am satisfied.” 

“Shall we not, then, seeing that he has been 
brought so low, make an effort to bring him under 
the care of this Great Physician? I have been 
thinking about it all day, and our conversation has 
only given strength to a half-formed purpose to visit 
and make one more effort to save him.” 

“ Let it be done by all means,” I replied. 

A gentleman who had known Mr. Granger came 
into my office at this moment, and when he learned 
of the utter debasement of the man, and of our pur- 
pose to make a new effort to reclaim hini, said: 
“ Why not place him in the new Beformatory Home 
recently established in our city ?” 

“ Deformation without regeneration will avail 
nothing in his case,” returned Mr. Stannard. “ The 
best reformatory agencies known have been tried, 


AS BY FIRE. 137 

but their influences proved only temporary. He was 
at Binghampton, you know.” 

“Yes, I am aware of that. But the institution to 
which I refer, is not an asylum for the treatment of 
drunkenness as a disease, but a Christian Home in 
which, while all the physical needs of the inmates 
are rightly cared for, an effort is made to bring them 
under religious influences, and to lead them to de- 
pend on God for safety.” 

“ Is there an institution like that in our city ?” 
asked Mr. Stannard, with much interest in his man- 
ner. “ I never heard of it before.” 

“ It is scarcely a year old,” was replied. “ But 
already the results obtained are quite remarkable.” 

“ Too short a time to predict much on results,” I 
said. “The reformation of a drunkard that dates 
back no farther than a year, gives little ground for 
confidence.” 

“ Much depends on the basis of the reformation,” 
remarked Mr. Stannard. “ Here, it strikes me, is 
the true basis, and I am ready to hope much. But 
what is the name of this institution and where is it 
located ?” 

“ You will find it in the very centre of our city. 
They call it the Franklin Reformatory Home for 
Inebriates ; and from what I have heard through one 
of the managers, whose heart is very much in the 
work, I am led to believe that in its treatment of 
drunkenness it has discovered and is using the only 
true remedy for that terrible disease which no medi- 


188 


SAVED 


cine for the body can ever radically cure. Its first 
work is to draw the poor, debased and degraded ine- 
briate within the circle of a well-ordered and cheerful 
home, and under the influence of kind and sympa- 
thetic friends. All these have been lost to him for 
years ; so utterly lost that all hope of their recovery 
has died in his heart. He is a stranger to gentle 
words and loving smiles ; — used only to rebuke and 
blame ; to scorn and contempt ; is alike despised of 
himself and the world. But here he flnds himself 
all at once an object of interest and care. His hand 
is taken in a clasp so warm and true that he feels the 
thrill go down into his heart and awaken old memo- 
ries of other and dearer hand-clasps. His lost man- 
hood and sense of respect are found again. Hew 
purposes are formed and old resolves — broken, alas! 
so many times — renewed once more. He flnds him- 
self encircled by sustaining influences of a better 
character than he has known in many years. Hope 
and confldence grow strong. 

“ But in lifting the fallen man to this state of life, 
the Home has done only its first and least important 
work of reformation. If it were able to do no more, 
‘Failure’ would ultimately be written on its walls. 
It is organized for deeper and more thorough work — 
is, in fact, a Church as well as a Home, and has its 
chapel and its formal worship. When the man is 
restored and in his right mind, an effort is made to 
lead him into the conviction that in and of himself 
he cannot successfully resist the appetite from whose 


AS BY FIRE. 


189 


slavery he has just escaped. That only in the Divine 
power and protection is there any hope for him, and 
that he must seek this Divine power and protection 
through prayer and a living and obedient faith in 
Christ, who saves to the uttermost all who come to 
Him and keep His sayings. He must become a new 
man. Must be saved not only from drunkenness, 
but from all other evils of life.^ Must become sincere, 
and humble, and just, and pure, as well as temperate. 
So becoming steadfast and immovable.” 

A light had kindled in Mr. Stannard’s face. Turn- 
ing to me, he said : “ There is hope for our poor 
friend. He may yet be saved. Is there not a provi- 
dence in this thing ?” 

“ I might say yes, if I believed in special provi- 
dences,” I returned. 

“ What kind of a providence do you believe in ?” 
Mr. Stan nard asked. 

“In a general overruling providence,” I re- 
plied. 

“ Of a providence, for instance, that takes care of 
a man’s whole body, but not of his eye, or ear, or 
heart, or any individual fibre, or nerve, or organ of 
which his body is composed. That takes care of a 
nation, but not of the individual men composing that 
nation. To have a general providence, Mr. Lyon, 
you must have a particular providence ; for without 
particulars you cannot have that which is general. 
Believe me, that God’s care is over you and me and 
every one, specially and at all times. It would be 


190 


SAVED 


no providence at all if this were not so. Let us think 
of it as round about us continually, and that if it 
were intermitted for a single moment, we would 
perish. Let us think of it as the infinite Love which 
is forever seeking to save us, and forever adapting 
the means to this eternal end.” 

“ You think more deeply about these things than 
I have been in the habit of doing, and may he nearer 
right in your views than I am in mine. I waive, for 
the present, all controversy on the subject. As for 
Mr. Granger, let us get him into this Home, and 
give him another chance. I believe in the church, 
and in the power of God to save men from their sins. 
And I believe more in this Home, from what I have 
just heard of it, than in any and all of the reformatory 
agencies in the land.” 

“ Because it is a church, a true church, seeking to 
gather poor lost and abandoned ones into the fold of 
Christ?” 

“ Yes, if you choose to give that form to the propo- 
sition,” I replied. 

“Is it not the true form? Can the Church have 
any higher mission than the one to which this Home 
has consecrated itself?” 

“ None,” was my answer. “ And yet the Church 
scarcely reaches out its hand to the perishing 
inebriate. Nay, draws hack from him her spot- 
less garments, and leaves him to perish in the 
mire from which her hands might have raised 
him.” 


AS BY FIRE. 


191 


“ Tlie Church learns but slowly,” Mr. Stannard 
replied, speaking with a shade of depression in his 
voice. “ It has been too busy with creeds and hair- 
splitting differences in doctrine, and with rituals, and 
robes, and things external, to give itself as it should 
to charity. A better day is not far distant, I hope. 
If, as has been said, the Church is the heart and 
lungs of common society, and if society is terribly 
diseased, spiritually as well as morally, is not the 
Church at fault and responsible'?- A healthy heart 
and healthy lungs should make a healthy body. 
Before the Church can heal the world she must be 
healed herself. She must rise into the perception of 
higher and diviner truths, and come down into the 
world with a more living power. It is difficult to 
tell which has the larger influence over the other to- 
day, the Church or the world. I sometimes fear it is 
the world, the Church is so pervaded with its spirit, 
and fashions, and ways of doing things, with its 
pride and its vanities. But here, in this Home 
of which we have been speaking, we have, thank 
God, the beginning of a real, earnest, working 
Church that knows the gospel of salvation, and 
is seeking by its power to lift up the fallen, to 
heal the broken-hearted, and to set the captive 
free.” 

Mr. Stannard had warmed as he spoke, and now 
there was a glow on his fine countenance. So inter- 
ested had we all become in the Home about which 
we were talking, that his suggestion that we should 


192 


SAVED 


make a visit and learn for ourselves what was being 
done there, met with a hearty concurrence, and we 
started at once to see and make ourselves better 
acquainted with the character and work of the new 
Institution. 



CHAPTER XIIL 


SELF-TRUST DEAD. 


N the day following I met Mr. Stannard, by 



Vy agreement. We had made arrangements for 
placing Granger in the new Home as soon as we 
could get him released, and thus give him another 
opportunity to recover himself. All my interest in 
the man was reviving, and hope gaining strength 
every moment. Our visit to the Reformatory Home 
had been most satisfactory. We found the organi- 
zation far more perfect than we had anticipated, see- 
ing that the Institution was yet in its infancy. After 
spending an hour with the president, who happened 
to be there when we called, and obtaining from him 
all the information desired, we made such prelimi- 
nary arrangements as were necessary for the admis- 
sion of Granger, and left with the new hope for the 
fallen man, we were about making an attempt to 
rescue, growing stronger in our hearts every mo- 


ment. 


Before going to the prison, we called on the dis- 
trict attorney, who, on learning our purpose, gave an 
order for Granger’s release, saying, as he did so : “I 
wish, gentlemen, that I could feel as hopeful as you 
seem to be in regard to the result. But I’m afraid 
the case is beyond cure. Poor fellow ! Our bar lost 


193 


194 


SA VED 


one of its brightest representatives in his fall. He 
was a splendid orator. I can hear his voice, now, 
ringing out in some of his grand periods. Ah, if 
he had but let drink alone !” 

“ If men would only take warning by a fall like 
this,” said Mr. Stannard. 

“ Few fall so rapidly or so low,” returned the dis- 
trict attorney. “ Some m'en are weak in the head 
where liquor is concerned, while others can drink 
on to the end, always maintaining a due modera- 
tion.” 

“ And every man who drinks believes that he can 
always hold himself to this due moderation.” 

“Yes, that is the case with most men ; but a few 
get over the line before becoming aware that they 
have touched it.” 

“ To find, like the too venturesome bather when 
struck by the undertow, that return is next to im- 
possible.” 

We went from the district attorney’s office direct 
to the prison, and were taken to the cell where 
Granger was confined. He was lying on his bed, 
apparently sleeping, but moved and turned towards 
us as we entered. At first I though there had been 
a mistake. Could that wasted, haggard face, and 
those large, deep-set, dreary eyes be the face and 
eyes of Alexander Granger ? It seemed impossible. 
But he had recognized us at a glance,* as I saw by 
the quick changes in his countenance, and made an 
effort to rise ; but sunk back weakly on his hard 


AS BY FIRE. 


195 


pallet, a feeble moan coming at the same time 
through his lips. 

“ My poor, unhappy friend !” I said, in a voice of 
tender sympathy, as I sat down on the bed and took 
one of his hands in mine. 

All the muscles of his face began to twitch and 
quiver. He, shut his eyes closely, but could not 
hold back the shining drops that were already 
passing through the trembling lashes. 

I waited a little while before speaking again, but 
kept tightly hold of his hand. 

“ Sick and in prison. My poor friend !” letting 
my voice fall to a lower and tenderer expression. 

He caught his breath with a sob. Tears fell over 
his cheeks. All the muscles of his face were shaking. 
I waited until the paroxysm was over. How weak 
and wasted he was ! As I looked at him, my heart 
grew heavy with compassion. 

“ There is still a chance for you, Mr. Granger,” 
said I, putting hope and confidence in my voice. 

There was no response ; not even a faint gleam 
on his wretched face. 

“ Will you not try again ?” 

“It won’t be of any use, Mr. Lyon. It’s very 
good of you ; but it won’t be of any use.” He spoke 
feebly and mournfully, moving his head slowly from 
side to side. 

“ It will be of use. I am sure that it will,” I said, 
with still more confidence. 

“ You don’t know anything about it, Mr. Lyon.” 


196 


SAVED 


His voice had gained a steadier tone ; but its utter 
hopelessness was painful. 

“ Here is Mr. Stannard,” I said. “ You remember 
him.” 

“ Yes. It’s very good of you, gentlemen. But 
I don’t deserve your kindness.” 

“ We are here as your friends,” said Mr. Stannard, 
coming close to the bed. “We are going to help 
you to get upon your feet again, and to become a 
new man.” 

He shook his head gloomily. 

“I’ve done trying. What’s the use of a man 
attempting to climb a hill when he knows that his 
strength must give out before he reaches the top, 
and that he will get bruised and broken in the inev- 
itable fall. Better die in the ditch at the bottom, as 
I shall die.” 

He had raised himself a little, and was leaning 
on his arm. 

“ You have been sick,” said I, wishing to take his 
mind away from the thought which was then hold- 
ing it. 

“Yes, worse than sick. I’ve been in hell and 
among devils.” 

“ But have escaped with your life.” 

“I’m not so sure. It’s about over with me, I 
guess. You see there’s not much left to go and 
come on.” 

He held up one of his thin, almost transparent 
hands, but could not keej) it steady. 



“ Yes, worse than sick, I’ve been in hell and among devils.”— Pap'e 190 . 






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AS BY FIBE.^ 199 

“ Don’t say that. There’s to be a new life within 
and without.” 

“ Not for me. Not for Alexander Granger. Do 
you know what I am here for ?” A dark cloud fall- 
ing on his face. “ For stealing ! — for petty larceny! 
You see it’s all over with 'me. The very shame of 
the thing is burning my life out. A thief! No, no, 
gentlemen. Even if I were able to stand against 
appetite, I could not bear up under a disgrace 
like this.” 

“ It was not Alexander Granger who committed 
this crime,” answered Mr. Stannard, “ but the in- 
satiate demon who had enslaved him and made him 
subject to his will. Let us cast out this demon and 
give the true, generous-hearted, honorable man back 
to himself and society again. It is for this that we 
are here, Mr. Granger.” 

He shook his head. “ If, in the full vigor of man- 
hood, I was not able to overcome and cast out this 
demon, what hope is there now ? ' It were folly to 
make the effort. No, no, gentlemen. I give up the 
struggle. All that is worth living for is gone. An 
utterly disgraced and degraded man, what is left for 
me but to die and be forgotten ? And I shall be 
better here, dying sober, than in the gutter or the 
station-house, dying drunk.” 

His voice trembled, and then broke in a repressed 
sob. 

“ There is One who can and who will save you, 
even from the power of this strong appetite which 


200 


SAVED 


Las so cursed you, my friend,” said Mr. Stannard, 
speaking with a gentle persuasion in his tones, and 
at the same time laying his hand softly on Granger’s 
head. “He is very near to you now — a loving 
Shepherd seeking for His lost sheep in the desolate 
wilderness, where it is ready to perish.” 

Then, kneeling, with his hand still on Granger’s 
head, he prayed in a low, hushed voice : 

“ Loving Father, tender Shepherd. This Thy 
poor wandering sheep is hungry and faint and ready 
to die. His flesh has been torn by the thorn and 
bramble; the wild beast has been after him, and 
the poison of serpents is in his blood. No help is 
left but in Thee, and unless Thy strong arm save 
him he will surely perish. Draw his heart toward 
Thee. Give him to feel that in Thee alone is hope 
and safety. In his helplessness and despair, let faith 
and trust be quickened. Thou canst save him from 
the power of this demon of drink. Thou canst set 
him in a safe way, and keep him from falling again. 
Give him to feel this great truth, that if he cast 
himself at Thy feet and cry from his sick and faint- 
ing heart, ‘ Save me. Lord !’ Thou wilt hear and save.” 

Can I ever forget the almost despairing cry for 
help that was in Granger’s voice as he repeated the 
words, “ Save me. Lord !” throwing his hands above 
his head as he spoke, and lifting his eyes upwards ? 
A strange thrill ran along my nerves. 

“ He will save you,” said Mr. Stannard, as he rose 
from his knees. “Trust in Him, and He will give 


AS BY FIRE. 


201 


you strength to overcome all your enemies. Though 
your sins be as scarlet, He will make them white as 
wool. They that trust in the Lord shall be as 
Mount Zion which, cannot be removed, but abideth 
forever. As the mountains are round about Jeru- 
salem, so the Lord is round about His people.” 

I saw a change in Granger’s face. It was grow- 
ing calmer and stronger. 

“ There is a new life before you, my friend ; and 
if you will look to God, and trust Him, and keep 
His words, you can live that life in safety. Will 
you try?” 

“ If I thought there was any use in trying. But 
what can I do ? Where can I go ?” 

There was a pleading expression in look and voice. 

“ Will you try ?” 

“ Yes, God helping me.” He spoke with a kind 
of trembling earnestness. 

“ We have a carriage outside,” I said. You will 
go with us ?” 

“ How can I go ? I’m a prisoner.” 

“A prisoner no longer. We have brought you a 
release.” 

“ Is this only a dream ?” he said, looking at us 
with a gathering doubt in his face. “ But I am sick 
and weak. I cannot walk. I can scarcely stand. 
I am not fit to go anywhere.” 

He was taken to the carriage we had in waiting, 
supported by two of the keepers. But few words 
passed as we drove into the city and over the rattling 
•13 


202 


SAVED 


streets to tlie institution where we had arranged to 
place him. He was very weak, and almost in a 
fainting condition when we reached our destination. 
Beyond the door our care of him ceased ; but we 
left money to procure clean clothing with which to 
replace, after he had received a bath, the poor, 
tattered and unclean garments that were on his 
person. 

“ If this fail, all fails,” I said to Mr. Stannard, as 
we came away. 

“ I do not believe it will fail,” he replied. 

“ I would gladly share your confidence, hut confess 
that I do not. The influences under which he will 
now come, are, I can see, more favorable than any 
that have heretofore been brought to hear upon him ; 
but there has been so great a physical and moral 
deterioration that I fear he can never get back the 
strength required for safe standing and sure resist- 
ance. 

“ He is stronger, in my opinion, to-day than he 
has been at any time in the last ten years.” 

“ I scarcely see the ground of your confidence,” 
said I. 

“ Stronger because all faith and all trust in himself 
are dead. He had given up the struggle when we 
found him in prison — given up to die, and his ‘ Save 
me. Lord !’ came from the depths of his utter despair. 
There will be no more trust in himself, I think ; no 
more matching of his weakness against the giant 
strength of an enemy before whose lighted blow he 


AS BY FIRE. 


203 


must surely fall. But a complete giving of himself 
into the care and protection of One who is not only 
mighty to save, but who saves to the uttermost all 
who come unto Him. Herein lies the ground of my 
confidence.” 

“In such a giving up, Mr. Stannard, what becomes 
of the manhood ? Is it wholly lost ?” 

“ It is in this surrender of ourselves to God that 
a higher and truer manhood is born. What is it to 
he a true man ? To let the appetites and passions 
rule ; or the reason, which, enlightened from above, 
can see and determine what is just, and pure, and 
merciful. Does the man possess himself so long 
as he lets the lower things of his nature rule over 
the higher? — his appetites and passions over his 
rational ? The whole order of man’s life has been 
reversed by sin. He has turned from God to him- 
self, and vainly thinks that true manhood consists 
in self-dependence and self-assertion ; as though his 
inmost life were his own, and not the perpetual gift 
of God. And so he tries to get as far away from 
God as possible, and to make a new life for himself; 
and as this new life begins in self, it is in the nature 
of things, a selfish life, and separates him from God 
and his neighbor. And he lives this life down in the 
lower regions of his mind, where sensual things 
reside — the appetites, the passions and the con- 
cupiscences. Is it any wonder that, so living, these 
sensual things should gain dominion over him — a 
dominion that nothing short of Divine power can 


204 


SAVED 


break ? Herein lies the loss of true manliood, wliieb 
can only be restored when we are willing to sell all 
that we have of self in order to buy heavenly treas- 
ures. Granger is not going to lose, but gain liis 
manhood.” 

“ Ah, what a gain that would be !” I felt oppressed 
with the inflowing pressure of new thoughts. I was 
beginning to see, dimly, how two men might pray 
to God to be delivered from evil, and the prayer of 
one be answered, while that of the other proved of 
no avail. Until a man is ready to give up his 
selfish life, and turn wholly from the evil of his 
ways, how can God help him to live the new and 
diviner life which will give him power to hold all 
the appetites and passions of his nature in due 
subjection and control. I saw for the first time an 
exact parallelism between spiritual and natural 
things. ' A vessel must be emptied of one substance 
before it can be filled with another. So must a soul 
be emptied of evil and selfishness before it can be 
filled with love to God and the neighbor. There 
must be poverty of spirit before the riches of Divine 
grace can be given. “ Blessed are the poor in spirit : 
for theirs is the kingdom of Heaven.” The text 
flashed upon me with a new and deeper meaning 
than it had ever before brought to my mind. 



CHAPTER XIV. 


AT THE REFORMATORY. 



N the following day I went to see Granger at 


V_/ the Reformatory Home. I found him in a 
clean, well-furnished and cheerful room. He was 
in bed, looking very pale ; but his eyes were clear 
and bright, and he welcomed me with a smile that 
played softly over his wasted features, and gave 
them a touch of their old fine quality. A book lay 
open on the bed. I saw that it was a copy of the 
New Testament. His manner was very subdued, 
and he did not speak until after I was seated ; and 
then not until I had asked how he was feeling. 
His answer almost gave me a start, it was so un- 
expected. He spoke in a low but even voice. 

“As if I were standing just inside the gate of 
Heaven.” 

I waited for a few moments before replying, for I 
scarcely knew what to say ; then remarked : “ I am 
glad you feel so comfortable. This is better than 
the station-house or the prison.” 

The light went out of his face, but came back 
quickly. 

“ But for you, my kind friend, I should now be 
dying in the cell from which you and good Mr. 
Stannard brought me yesterday. It was God who 


205 


206 


SAVED 


sent you ; and it seems as if I shall never be done 
thanking Him. My poor heart broke all down when 
Mr. Stannard prayed for me. It seemed as if God 
were all at once bending right over me, and when I 
cried out to Him in my helplessness, I had a feeling 
as if His arms were reached out and I taken into 
them. And I believe it was so.” 

“ May they ever be round about you,” I replied, 
scarcely able to keep my voice steady, for I was not 
prepared for this, and it affected me strangely. 

“ Nothing less can save me from the assaults of 
my enemy,” he said, his countenance growing more 
serious. 

I remained with him for half an hour, and when 
I left, my confidence in this new efibrt at reforma- 
tion was greatly increased. An incident of the visit 
gave me large encouragement. As I sat talking with 
him there came a rap on the door, and then a lady, 
in company with the matron of the Institution, en- 
tered. I knew her well by sight. She was related 
to a family of high social standing; and while a 
woman of refinement and intelligence, and an orna- 
ment to the circle in which she moved, was largely 
given to good works. Her hand as well as her heart 
were in many charities. She had often met Mr. 
Granger and his wife in their better days, and was 
among those who had been deeply pained at his 
downfall. A member of the Auxiliary Board of 
Lady Managers, she had learned on her visit to the 
Home that Mr. Granger was there, and all her in- 


AS BY FIRE. 


207 


terest was at once awakened. To save liiin and 
restore him to his family and society, was something ■ 
to he hoped for, and prayed for, and worked for ; 
and she lost no time in seeing him, and letting him 
feel the warmth of her interest in his welfare. 

I was talking with Granger, as just said, when 
this lady, whom I will call Mrs. Ellis, entered his 
neat little chamber. He knew her, of course, and I 
saw a slight tinge of color steal over his pale face as 
she came to the bedside. 

“ I am right glad to see you here, Mr. Granger,” 
she said, with an interest so genuine that it affected me. , 

“ And I am glad to be here, Mrs. Ellis,” he re- 
plied, in a voice subdued but earnest. “ It is like 
coming out of hell into Heaven.” 

“ May it indeed be as the gate of Heaven to your 
soul,” she responded. “ If that be so, all will be 
well with you again. And I pray for you that it 
may be so. Only look to the blessed Saviour and 
trust in Him, and you shall be as Mount Zion, which 
cannot be removed.” 

She remained only for a few minutes, but said as 
she was going out: “You are now among true friends, 
Mr, Granger, and they will do everything in their 
power to help you. Take heart ; it is all going to 
come out right again.” 

He was much affected by this brief visit, and after 
Mrs. Ellis had left the room said, in a half-wonder- 
ing tone of voice : “ I can hardly understand it all. 
What is she doing here ?” 


208 


SAVED 


I explained to him that she was one of the Lad}^ 
Managers of the Institution, through whose constant 
care and supervision the highest comfort of the in- 
mates was secured. That the presence of these ladies 
in the Home, as visitors and supervisors, enabled 
them to gain an influence with the inmates that was 
very helpful. They made themselves acquainted, as 
far as possible, with the nature of their domestic re- 
lations, if they had families, and if their families 
were in destitute circumstances, visited them and did 
whatever lay in their power to help them. Many 
desolate homes had already been made bright and 
happy through their agency. 

Granger listened with half-closed lids while I 
spoke of all this. A deep sigh was his only response 
when I ceased speaking. His thoughts had evidently 
drifted out of the room in which he was lying, and 
gone far away from the Home. I did not break the 
spell of thought that was upon him, but waited until 
he came back to himself again. 

“ It seems still as if I were only dreaming,” he 
said, lifting his eyes at length and looking at me with 
a kind of wistful earnestness. “As if I would awaken 
at any moment into the old, dreadful life.” 

“ You may dream this dream to the end if you 
will,” I replied. 

“ God keep me from waking !” He gave a slight 
shiver as he said this. 

At my next visit I found Granger well enough to 
be down stairs. He was in the reading-room talking 


AS BY FIRE. 


209 


with an intelligent-looking man, whose face I recog- 
nized as one with which I was familiar. I did not 
at first know this man, but when he reached out his 
hand and called me by name, his voice brought him 
to my recollection. He had once been a merchant, 
standing at the head of a firm doing a large busi- 
ness ; but wine, the mocker, had betrayed him, 
and he had fallen into hopelessly dissolute habits. 
When I last saw him he was staggering on the 
street. 

“ Why, Lawrence !” I exclaimed, in pleased sur- 
prise. “You here?” 

“Yes, I am here, friend Lyon. And here is our 
old friend Granger. You remember him.” 

“ Of course I do,” taking the hand of Mr. Gran- 
ger as I spoke, who gave me back a silent pressure. 

I looked at the two men, wondering at the change 
which had been wrought in them ; noticing, as I 
have had occasion to notice many times since, the 
quick restoration of the face, after drink is aban- 
doned, to something of its old, true character. 

We sat down and had a long talk. Mr. Lawrence 
informed me that he had been there about five 
weeks, and was now holding the position of book- 
keeper in the store of one of the directors of the 
Home, but still boarded in the Institution, as he felt 
that he needed all the help it could give him. He 
had been separated for over two years from his wife, 
who was now living in a distant city ; but he had 
already written to her, telling the good news of his 


210 


SAVED' 


reformation, and of his purpose, by God’s help, to 
keep himself forever free from his old habits. 

“ And here’s a letter from her that I received to- 
day,” he said, as he took an envelope from his pocket, 
with an almost child-like exhibition of pleasure. 
“ And she writes that she’ll be here in two weeks. 
She was always so good and so true, and she stayed 
by me until it was of no use. Poor Helen !” 

I did not wonder at the dimness that came over 
his eyes ; nor at the break and gurgle in his voice. 

“ But it shall never so be again,” he went on, 
after a little pause. “ I trusted in myself, and did 
not care for God. He was never in my thoughts. 
But I have found a better way since I came here, 
and One who will keep me in that way if I look to 
Him — walking always by my side. So long as I 
put my trust in Him, I shall be safe, but not for a 
moment longer.” 

I was looking at Granger, and saw that his gaze 
was fixed intently on Mr. Lawrence. His eyes were 
a little dilated and there was a shade of sadness on 
his countenance. He did not take any part in the 
conversation. When an opportunity came for us to 
be alone, and I could ask more particularly about 
him, his manner changed and brightened ; but was 
more subdued than on the occasion of my previous 
visit. 

“ You are looking so much better,” I said, “ and 
are feeling, of course, as w^ell as you look.” 

“ I hope so,” he answered, quietly. Then, after 


AS BY FIRE. 211 

a slight pause: “If one could only stop thinking 
sometimes.” 

“ Eight thinking is the way to right acting,” I 
replied, speaking in an aphorism, because I was not 
sure as to what was in his thought, nor how my 
answer might he taken. 

“ If it were as easy to do right as to think right, 
living in this world would he safer than it is. But 
that is not what I meant. It is the trouble of un- 
availing thought to which I refer. Ah ! if I could 
only stop this kind of thinking for awhile. If I 
could only bury the past out of sight !” 

“ If your future be as the verdure of spring and 
the fruitfulness of summer, the past will ere long be 
covered, as the earth after a desolate winter is covered 
with greenness and beauty. The influx of life into 
what is orderly and good is quick and strong. You 
are already beginning to feel this influx, my friend. 
May it have steady increase.” 

A man came into the room where we sat convers- 
ing, and, after taking a book from the library, went 
out. I noticed that he had an intelligent face, and 
an air of reflnement, but looked wasted and broken 
as though just risen from a severe illness. 

“ That is Dr. E ,” said Granger. “ He had 

a large practice in our city a few years ago, but lost 
it on account of intemperance. His family was 
broken up at last— wife and children being com- 
pelled to leave him. This breaking up of his family 
and separation from his wife and children so affected 


212 


SAVED 


him that he quit drinking and started off for a 
western city, in order to get away from old associa- 
tions, there to begin life anew, and make for his 
family another home into which the old blight and 
curse should never come. But this change did not 
take him out of the sphere of temptation, nor dimin- 
ish' the strength of his appetite. He fought allure- 
ment and desire for awhile, and then yielded, little 
by little at a time, still fighting, hut steadily losing 
the power to resist, until he was down again. That 
was five years ago. Falling and rising ; now strug- 
gling for the mastery over his appetite, and now in 
its toils again ; now taking his place in respectable 
society, and now rejected and despised; never stand- 
ing firm for longer than a few months at a time — 
the years since then have passed. Two weeks ago 
he came drifting back to his native city, a poor, 
helpless, broken wreck, with a vague impression on 
his mind that he was being impelled hither by a 
force he could not resist. He came, as a drifting 
wreck, wholly purposeless. Let me tell you the 
story of what followed, just as he told it to me. I 
give you his own words as near as I can remember 
them. He said : 

“ ‘ A man in Pittsburg, to whom I told a plausible 
story, in which was not a single word of truth, got 
a pass for me on the railroad to this city, and gave 
m.e two dollars with which to get something to eat 
on the way. The first thing I did, after parting 
from him, was to buy a bottle of whisky. With this 


AS BY FIRE. 


213 


as my companion, I took my seat in the second-class 
car to which my pass assigned me and started on my 
journey eastward. The bottle was empty before half 
the distance had been made. It was filled at one of 
the stopping places, and emptied again before the 
trip was completed. So drunk that I could not 
walk steadily, I was thrust out of the car by a break- 
man on the arrival of the train at midnight, and sent 
into the street homeless and friendless. I still had 
forty cents in my pocket, and might have procured 
a night’s lodging, but I preferred the station-house 
to a comfortable bed, in order that I might have the 
means of getting my drink in the morning. When 
morning came, I made a narrow escape from a com- 
mitment to the county prison for drunkenness and 
vagrancy, but got off with a reprimand and a warn- 
ing. At a cheap restaurant I spent fifteen cents for 
a breakfast, and ten cents for something to wash it 
down. In less than an hour afterwards the remain- 
ing fifteen cents had disappeared, and I was the 
worse for three glasses of bad whisky. 

“ ‘ Aimless and miserable, I wandered about for 
the whole of that day ; spending the greater part of 
my time in bar-rooms, in the hope of being asked by 
somebody to drink. My thirst was growing intense. 
I was beginning to feel desperate. Late in the after- 
noon I went into a saloon and going up to the bar, 
called for a glass of whisky, making a motion with 
my hand as if I were going to take money from my 
pocket. The bar-keeper eyed me sharply for a mo- 


214 


SAVED 


merit or two, and then gave me the liquor for which 
I had called. It was at my mouth and down my 
throat with the quickness of a flash. I knew by the 
man’s face that he would kick me out of the saloon, 
hut what cared I for that ! My fumbling in my 
pockets, and turning them inside out, and my call- 
ing on God to witness that I had money when I 
came in, did not save me. I was collared and 
dragged to the door, and then kicked into the street.- 
As I fell on the pavement, a crowd of boys jeered 
me, and when I attempted to rise, pushed me over. 
A friendly policeman saved me from their farther 
persecutions. 

“ ‘ I was not drunk. The glass of whisky which 
I had taken did nothing more than give a little 
steadiness to my nerves. As I arose from the jiave- 
ment, assisted by the policeman, I saw on the opposite 
side of the street a face that made my heart stand 
still. A young girl had stopped, and was looking 
across at me with a half-startled, half-pitiful expres- 
sion. It was my own daughter, whom I had not 
seen for five years. A little girl of twelve when I 
last saw her, she was now a tall and beautiful young 
lady in her eighteenth year. Her dress was plain, 
but very neat, and she looked as if she might be on 
her way home from some store, or office, or manu- 
factory, in which she was earning a livelihood. 
Scarcely had I recognized her, ere she turned and 
went on her way. But it seemed as if I could not 
let her go out of my sight. As though some strong 


AS BY FIRE. 


215 


invisible chords were drawing me, I started after 
her, keeping so close that her form was always in 
view. So I followed, now within a few paces, and 
now farther behind, lest she might turn and recog- 
nize me, until we had gone for a distance of seven 
or eight blocks. Then she passed lightly up to the 
door of a house, and after ringing the bell, turned 
her face while she stood waiting, so that I could see 
it again. It came to me like a gleam of sunlight. 
But in a moment after the sweet vision was gone, 
and I stood in outer darkness. 

“‘I lingered about the neighborhood until the 
fast failing twilight was gone. Night shut in ; the 
lamps were lighted, and the hurrying sound of home- 
ward feet became almost silent. And still I lingered. 
Inside were, I believed, the wife and children I had 
once so loved and tenderly cared for ; and I stood on 
the outside, an alien to the love which had once 
been given me in lavish return. Twice I ascended 
the steps and laid my hand on the bell, but turned 
each, time and went back without ringing it. I will 
go away, I said, and make myself more fitted to 
come into their presence. But where was I to go ? 
Friendless and penniless, soiled and tattered, who 
would take me in ? And then there rushed upon 
me such an overwhelming sense of helplessness and 
degradation, and of the utter folly of any new at- 
tempt to lead a better life, that the very blackness 
of despair came down upon my soul ! Better die ! 
said a voice within me. Better take the chances of 


216 


SAVED 


the life to come than the certain misery of this. 
God is more merciful than man. I hearkened 
to this voice. A single plunge in the river, and all 
would be over. I felt the waters closing about me, 
and the rest and peace of their dark oblivious depths. 
I Avas sitting on the curb-stone with my face buried 
in my hands, when this purpose was reached, and 
was about rising to put it into execution, Avhen a 
hand was laid on my shoulder, and a voice, whose 
tones sent a thrill through me, said ; “ You seem to 
be in trouble, my friend.” It was the voice of a man 
whose family physician I had been more than ten 
years before, and its sound was as familiar to my 
ears as if no time had intervened since I heard it 
last. I could not move. A great weight seemed 
holding me down. “Are you sick?” The voice 
was even kinder than at first. “ Yes,” I replied. 
“ Sick with an incurable disease.” • 

“ ‘ He did not speak again for several moments. 
Then he said, in a voice full of mingled compassion 

and surprise ; “Dr. E, ! Can it indeed he you ?” 

“ All that is left of me,” I returned, not looking up 
or attempting to rise. “ Sick, but not with an in- 
curable disease. Dr. R ,” he said, after a brief 

pause. “There is a Physician who can cure all 
manner of sickness. He can make the lame walk, 
the deaf hear, the blind see, and bring even the 
dead to life. Come to this good Physician, my old 
friend, and be healed of your malady.” 

“ ‘ How strange and new this sounded — almost as 

O 


AS BY FIBE. 


217 


mucli so as if I had never before heard of this Phy- 
sician ; and in fact, so far as any conscious need of 
Him was concerned, I never had. Sickness of the 
soul and the healing of spiritual diseases had been 
to me little more than figures of speech ; and my 
idea of a Physician of souls had rarely lifted itself 
above the thought of a vague symbolism that might 
mean anything or nothing. But now there was in 
it something tangible ; the impression of a real per- 
sonality ; and my poor, despairing heart began to 
turn and lift itself, and to feel in its dead hopes the 
feeble motions of a new life. And when he said 
again, “ Come, my old friend, come to this good 
Physician,” and drew upon my arm, I got up from 
the curb-stone on which I was sitting, and stood 
cowering and trembling in my shame and weakness, 
dimly wondering as to how and where this Physician 
was to be found. “ And now, doctor,” he said, “ do 
you really wish to be saved from the power of this 
dreadful appetite ?” “ I would rather drown myself 

than continue any longer in this awful bondage,” I 
replied. 

“ ‘ And then I told him how I had made up my 
mind to gain deliverance through the desperate 
means of suicide. “ My poor friend,” he answered, 
“ there is a safer and better way. Come with me.” 

“ ‘ I did not hesitate, but went with him. As we 
walked, he told me of this Christian Home, and said 
that if I would enter it and make use of all the 
means of reformation to which it would introduce 
14 


218 


SAVED 


me, I might hope to he restored to myself, and gain 
such power over my appetite as to hold it forever in 
check. And here I am, with new hopes and new 
purposes, and a trust in God for deliverance and 
safety, that my heart and my reason tell me shall 
not be in vain.’ ” 

After Mr. Granger had related Dr. R ’s story, 

he said : “ If that man can be saved, and if I can be 
saved, through trust in God, no one is so fallen that 
he may not be lifted up, and his feet set in a secure 
way.” Then, after a slight pause, he added, in a 
subdued and humble voice : “ But in and of myself 
I cannot hope to stand. When I forget that, my 
imminent peril is nigh.” 



CHAPTER XV. 


A NEW AND BETTER LIFE. 



FTER two or three weeks, the change in Mr. 


Granger’s appearance was so great that I found 
it difficult to realize the fact that he was the same 
man whom we had, a little while before, taken from 
the county prison. Nutritious food was rapidly 
restoring muscular waste, and giving tension to 
shattered nerves. Sound sleep was doing its good 
work also. While above all, and vital to all, was a 
new-born trust in God, and a submission of himself 
to the Divine will and guidance. 

I could see the steady growth of a new quality in 
his face ; the expression of which was becoming 
softer, yet not losing the strength of a true manli- 
ness. The old, confident ring did not come hack to 
his voice ; though it gained in firmness, and you felt 
in its tone the impulse of a resolute will. 

Up to this time I had said nothing to Granger 
about his wife and children, nor had he referred to 
them ; but I knew, from signs not to be mistaken, 
that they were hardly for a moment absent from his 
thoughts ; and I was sure that his heart was going 
out to them with irrepressible yearnings. It could 
not be otherwise, for he was a man of warm affec- 
tions. 


219 


220 


SAVED 


Nor had I said anything of this new effort at 
reformation to Mrs. Granger, whom I had seen twice 
since she told me of her husband’s visit to the photo- 
graph rooms. I had been trying ever since to find 
another place for Amy, but so far was not successful. 
Why should I keep the good news away from her 
any longer ?• I had withheld it so far, in fear lest 
the hope and joy it must occasion might too quickly 
be dashed to the ground. But now I was beginning 
to have a more abiding faith in this last struggle 
upon which Granger had entered ; because of the 
new and higher elements of strength it was calling 
into exercise. 

For several days I debated the question, and then 
dropped a note to Mrs. Granger, asking her to call 
at my office. She came promptly, hoping that I had 
succeeded in finding a situation for her daughter. I 
had not noticed before how much her beautiful hair 
had changed. It was thickly sprinkled with gray. 
A shadow lay in her large brown eyes, which had 
lost much of their former depth and brightness. 
There was an earnest, expectant manner about her 
as she came forward. I saw that she was troubled 
and anxious, and half-regretted having sent for 
her, not knowing, of course, how she might be 
affected by the information I was about to commu- 
nicate. 

“Any good word for Amy ?” she asked, with an 
effort to keep her voice from betraying the suspense 
from which she was suffering. 


AS BY FIRE. 


221 


“ Nothing certain, as yet,” I replied. “ But there’s 
something else that I wish to talk with you about.” 

Her large eyes widened a little. She asked no 
question, but kept her gaze fixed upon me. 

“Have you heard anything from Mr. Granger 
since Amy was at the photograph rooms ?” 

She shook her head, hut did not remove her eyes 
from my face. 

“You did not know that he was arrested and 
sent down to prison ?” 

A slight negative movement of the head, and a 
close, hard shutting of the lips. 

“I heard of it, and went with a friend to see 
him.” 

A start, a catching of the breath, and a receding 
color. 

“ I think he must have died within twenty-four 
hours if we had not taken him from the cell in 
which we found him. Utterly broken down in body 
and spirits, he had given up in despair.” 

The eyes of Mrs. Granger dropped swiftly from 
my face. I saw a strong shiver run through her 
body. Then she was motionless as a statue. 

“ Mr. Stannard and I went to see him,” I resumed. 
“We had an order for his release, and took him to 
the new Reformatory Home in Locust Street, where 
he has been ever since.” 

Mrs. Granger raised her eyes and looked at me 
again. No light had come into them. If anything, 
the shadow that lay over them was deeper. I was 


222 


SAVED 


disappointed at this apparent indifference, and at her 
failure to ask me any questions in regard to her 
husband. 

“Mr. Stannard and I feel very hopeful about 
him.” 

She shook her head in a dreary way. “ There is 
no hope,” she murmured, in a dead level voice. “ It 
was kind of you and Mr. Stannard, and you meant 
well. But it will be of no use. If you had brought 
me word that he was dead, I would have felt thank- 
ful to know that his helpless, hopeless, wretched life 
was over. It is hard for me to say this, Mr. Lyon, 
but I can say nothing less. He is in the hands of a 
demon whose strength, as compared with his, is as 
that of a giant to a new-born infant.” 

“ Is not God stronger than any devil ?” I asked, 
speaking with quiet earnestness. 

There was another quick, half-wondering dilation 
of her large eyes, and a swift change in her counte- 
nance. She waited for me to go on. 

“ There is no sin from which God cannot save a 
man,” said I. 

“Except, I have sometimes thought, the sin of 
drunkenness; it so utterly degrades and destroys the 
soul. It seems to leave nothing upon which men, 
or angels, or even God Himself can take hold.” 

She spoke with some bitterness, but with more of 
doubt and sorrow in her voice. 

“ Many men,” I replied, “ who had fallen quite as 
low as Mr. Granger, have been saved from this 


A8 BY FIRE. 


223 


dreadful sin and curse by means of the Institution 
where we have placed your husband, and are back 
in their old social places again, and restored to their 
once broken and deserted families.” 

A death-like paleness swept suddenly into her 
face. She reached out her hands and caught the 
table by which she was sitting, holding on to it 
tightly, and trembling violently. 

“ Have you not heard about this Franklin Home?” 
I asked. 

She shook her head, her lips moving in a silent No. 

“ It is a Christian home,” I said. “ All its inmates 
are brought under Christian influences. There is 
daily readings of the Scripture, and also family 
prayer in the chapel of the Institution. Every Sun- 
day evening religious worship is held in this chapel, 
and in the afternoon of Sunday there is a Bible 
class. First and last the inmates are taught that 
only by God’s grace and help can they ever hope to 
overcome completely the sin of drunkenness. They 
must fight this, as well as all other evil habits and 
inclinations, shunning them as sins against God, and 
looking to Him for the strength that will give them 
the victory ; so seeking to be saved from all sins, 
and coming thereby completely within the sphere of 
His Divine protection.” 

The manner of Mrs. Granger was that of one who 
did not clearly understand what was being said to 
her. There were rapid changes in her face, lights 
and shadows passing swiftly across it. 


224 


SAVED 


“ For over three weeks your husband has been in 
this Home, and the improvement is so great as to be 
almost marvelous.” 

She laid her head down upon my office table, and 
I saw that she was weeping. 

“ I have never had so great faith in your hus- 
band’s efforts at reform as I feel now. He has passed 
below the limit of self-confidence ; has lost all 
faith in himself ; knows that he cannot stand in his 
own strength; that only God can help and save 
him.” 

I heard the ofiSce door open, and turning, saw Mr. 
Granger. As I uttered his name in a tone of sur- 
prise, his wife sprang to her feet, and turned toward 
him a face from which the color had gone out sud- 
denly. The two gazed at each other for some mo- 
ments, standing a little apart, their startled faces all 
convulsed. 

“ Helen ! Oh, my poor Helen !” came trembling 
from Granger’s lips, as he saw the sad changes which 
a few sorrowful years had wrought upon her. There 
was an involuntary reaching out of his hands ; but 
he held himself away. His voice was inexpressibly 
tender and pitiful. Still, very still, she stood ; then 
I saw a slight movement, and then, with a low cry, 
“ My husband ! my husband !” she sprang forward 
and laid her head on his bosom, his arms at the same 
moment gathering tightly around her. I went out 
and left them alone. When I came back, they were 
gone. 


AS BY FIRE. 


225 


I was concerned about this. Granger had been, 
I felt, too short a time at the Home to be safely re- 
moved from its influence. I was not one of those 
who believed that in an instant of time a sinner was 
washed white and clean, and lifted wholly away 
from temptation and danger. To be born again, 
converted, renewed by the Spirit, had for me a dif- 
ferent meaning. I had thought much about these 
things of late, and held many conversations with 
Mr. Stannard, whose mind to me seemed peculiarly 
enlightened. I believe that man must be a co-worker 
with God. That there was no washing until after 
repentance and the putting away of evils as sins ; and 
that the “ every whit clean,” when applied to young 
converts, was a fallacy, and in consequence a snare ; 
that “He that overcometh, the same shall be clothed 
in white raiment,” and none others. I believed that 
a change of heart was a gradual thing, progressing 
with the new life of obedience to Divine laws, and 
that as obedience was continued and perfected, the 
new spiritual man became stronger and stronger, 
until at last able to stand firm, though all hell were 
in battle array against him. 

Only a few weeks since we had lifted this man 
out of the mire and clay ; only a few weeks of the 
new and better life. Was he strong enough to leave 
the safe harbor in which he had been anchored for 
so short a time, and try the open sea again ? I did 
not believe it. My fear was, that he had gone 
home with Mrs. Granger, and that he would not re- 


226 


SAVED 


turn again to the Institution in which we had placed 
him. If this were so, I should tremble for his safety. 

In the evening I went to the Home, and, to my 
great relief, found Mr. Granger in the reading-room. 
The whole expression of his countenance had 
changed. There was a light in it which I had not 
seen before. He grasped my hand and held it firmly 
for a few moments without speaking. 

“ Coming out right very fast,” said I. 

“ Yes, faster than I had dared to hope,” he replied. 

“ Did you go home with your wife ?” 

“ No. We walked together for an hour after leav- 
ing your ofiSce, and then I came back here. I am 
too weak yet for any great trial of my strength. It 
is easy enough to stand with all these helps around 
me ; but I must grow stronger in myself before I 
attempt to walk alone. And then I cannot be a 
burden to my poor wife, who is already overtaxed in 
her efforts to keep a home for our children. As soon 
as possible I must get something to do that I may 
come to her relief.” 

“ Will you open a law ofl&ce again ?” 

“ Law is my profession. T have no skill in any- 
thing else. It is my only way of return to business 
and profit. Yes, just as soon as I feel strong enough 
to make the effort, I shall endeavor to get into prac- 
tice. In passing along Walnut Street to-day^ I saw 
several small ofiices to let, any one of which would 
suit me. My great drawback will be the want of a 
law library.” 


AS BY FIRE. 


227 


“ Don’t let that trouble you,” I replied. “ There 
are plenty of old friends in the profession who will 
gladly let you have the use of books until you are 
able to buy for yourself. As soon as it is seen that 
you are in real earnest about getting on your feet 
again, you will receive a warm welcome and the 
grasp of many helping hands.” 

Within six weeks from the time Granger came 
out of prison, he had a desk in the office of a promi- 
nent lawyer, whose large practice enabled him to 
throw considerable business in his way from the very 
start. He still remained at the Reformatory Home, 
where, for a moderate price, he had a well-furnished 
room and excellent board. He not only identified 
himself with the Institution, but became deeply in- 
terested in the work of reform. He had, himself, 
been a cast-away on the desolate shore where so 
many thousands are wrecked every year ; and he 
knew all the pains and horrors of such disasters. 
His pity and his sympathy drew towards him every 
new inmate of the Home, and prompted him to do 
all that lay in his power to encourage, comfort and 
help him to begin that new and higher life, in which, 
as he never failed to urge, true and permanent safety 
could alone be found. 

“ Have you ever attended religious services at the 
Home on Sunday evening?” Mr. Stannard asked, 
one day. It was about two months after Mr. Gran- 
ger’s admission. I had not. 

“ Come round to-morrow night. It will interest 


228 


SAVED 


you. Rev. Mr. S is going to preach to the 

men.” 

I went, and, to my surprise, found a little chapel, 
which held about two hundred, so well filled that 
only a few seats remained. There were quite as 
many women as men; wives, mothers, sisters or 
friends of the inmates. A little way back from the 
reading-desk I noticed Mr. Granger, and it almost 
took my breath when I saw his wife sitting on one 
side of him and his danghter on the other. There 
was reading from the Bible, and one or two hymns, 
in which the whole congregation joined heartily. 
Then a most excellent sermon from one of the lead- 
ing clergymen of the city. 

It was a long time since I had been so much im- 
pressed as by the services of this evening. I sat 
where I could look into the faces of nearly all who 
were present. Just in front of me was Mr. Gran- 
ger, and beside him his wife and daughter, all at- 
tentive listeners to the discourse. Not far from them 
I recognized the person of Dr. R . He sat be- 

tween two women, also, and I had no doubt from the 
way they leaned towards him, or turned now and 
then to look at him, that one was his wife and the 
other the daughter whom he had followed for so 
many blocks in the street, too sorely conscious of his 
degradation to dare even to speak to her. And Mr. 
Lawrence, who had written to his wife and received 
the promise of her speedy return, was there likewise; 
and by him sat a woman with a calm, strong, true 


AS BY FIRE. 


229 


face, and I saw, with a throb of feeling, which sent 
the moisture to my eyes, that she was holding one of 
his hands tightly in one of hers. 

There were nearly a hundred men present who 
had been, or were now, inmates of the Institution ; 
and wives, sisters and mothers almost as many more. 
Sad, indeed, was the writing on nearly all of the 
faces into which I gazed; but light mingled with 
the shadows. There were men before me who had 
been drunkards for over ten and twenty years — 
some for even a longer time — and women who had 
borne the awful sorrow of the drunkard’s wife for 
periods quite as long. 

What followed touched me most of all. After the 
benediction was said, and the congregration began 
slowly to retire, I saw little groups of twos and threes 
and fours gathering here and there, standing or sit- 
ting, and soon comprehended what it meant. Here 
you saw a husband and wife, who had lived apart 
for years, sitting close together in earnest conversa- 
tion ; and there wife and children gathered about a 
husband and father who had long been lost to them, 
but was now found again. What light, and even 
joy, were to be seen in the faces of many, the women’s 
faces especially. And it was affecting to notice some 
of the children — little girls more particularly — ^hold- 
ing tightly to their I father’s hands, sitting close to 
and leaning against them, or looking up lovingly 
into their faces. There were many tender re-unions 
that night in the little chapel, above whose reading- 


230 


SAVED 


desk a silken banner held the inscription, “ By the 
Grace of God, I am what I am.” 

I made my way, as soon as the crowd had cleared 
a little, to where Mr. Granger and his wife and 
daughter were standing together. They looked very 
happy — ^yes, “ happy ” is the word — and greeted me 
with much cordiality. 

“ Is this the first time you have attended worship 
in our chapel ?” Mr. Granger asked. 

“ The first time,” I replied. “ But I feel as if it 
was not going to be the last. I have heard people 
speak of the ‘ sphere of worship,’ but never knew 
what it meant until to-night.” 

“ It is because,” he answered, “ there are very few 
in the congregations that assemble here on Sunday 
evenings, who do not feel that their only hope is in 
God, and that without His grace they cannot stand 
for a moment.” 

“ Who are all the people I see around me?” I 
asked. 

“ About thirty of the men are present inmates of 
the Home. Nearly all the rest were formerly in- 
mates, and are standing firm. They come here on 
Sunday evenings ; and those who have families bring 
their wives, and many their children. If one absents 
himself from these Sunday evening services, there 
is a feeling of concern in regard to him ; for expe- 
rience has shown, that the first sign. of danger is a 
manifest indifference to the things of religion. I 
never look at that banner above the reading-desk, 


AS BY FIRE. 


231 


without a new sense of my entire dependence on God 
for strength to walk safely in the midst of tempta- 
tion ; and I am sure that its silent admonition has 
wrought a like influence with many others. It is 
by God’s grace that I am what I am.” 

Mrs. Granger’s large eyes were flxed on her hus- 
band’s face while he spoke ; and I saw something of 
their old charm coming back into them. A soft 
smile was hovering like a faint gleam of sunshine on 
her lips. We moved back the chairs amid which 
we were standing, making with them a small circle, 
and sat down together. 

“ My last night in the Home,” said Granger, after 
a brief silence. His voice had lost some of its 
steadiness. 

“ Indeed !” I betrayed a little surprise. 

“Yes.” He turned towards his wife, looking at 
her tenderly. We are going to set up our household 
gods again.” * 

The smile grew warmer on her lips. 

“We have taken a little home, and are going to 
make a new start in life ; and there is going to be in 
this home what was never seen in the old home. 
Shall I tell you what that is, my good friend to 
whom I owe so much ?” 

I waited for him to go on. Hushing his voice, 
and speaking reverently, he said : “A family altar.” 

Before the silence that followed was broken, we 
were joined by the president and two or three 
gentlemen who were active in the management of 


232 


SAVED 


the Home. _ While I was talking with them, Mr. 
and Mrs. Granger, with their daughter, drew aAvay, 
and a little while afterwards I saw them separate at 
the door of the chapel. 

On the next day Granger left the Institution, and 
Avent back into the old common life, to try, amidst 
its thousand enticements to evil, the new sources of 
strength in which he was now trusting for safety. 




CHAPTER XVI. 


FIGHTING THE GOOD FIGHT. 

S TILL in the very prime of manhood, the springs 
of action were yet strong. An orderly life 
soon restored Granger to a measure of the old vigor, 
and it was not long before cases of importance began 
to come into his hands. And now my concern for 
him began to grow again. If the engrossing cares 
of his profession, and the worldliness that creeps in 
so easily through the door that prosperity opens, 
should draw him into religious indifference, and 
inspire him with self-confidence, would not the old 
peril return ? 

One thing gave me much assurance. Granger 
had identified himself with the cause of temperance, 
and made frequent public addresses. He took an 
active part in all the movements designed to effect 
restrictive legislation, and was the author of several 
able articles in which the magnitude of the liquor 
trafiic, and its attendant evils were set forth with 
startling boldness. 

Had the family altar been set up? Yes. I put 
the question direct about six months after he had 
left the Institution in Locust Street. He laid his 
hand quietly but firmly on my arm as he replied : 
“In my home and in my heart.” 

15 


233 


234 


SAVED 


His countenance softened, and his eyes grew 
tender. I learned then for the first time that he had 
become much interested in church work, and had 
been chiefiy instrumental in the establishment of a 
mission school in a destitute part of the city ; and 
that he did not confine his efforts alone to the poor 
children who were gathered into this school, but 
endeavored to reach with good influences their 
parents, many of whom were sadly degraded, and 
most of them intemperate. On expressing my 
gratification, he merely said : “ I would make a poor 
return for all the good I have received, if I did not 
try to do something for others. The heart that 
closes itself to gratitude, closes itself to higher and 
diviner things. If the love of God be in a man, it 
must prompt him to help and save others ; and his 
love is spurious — of himself and selfish — call it by 
what name he may, if it does not do this.” 

“ What about that old appetite ?” I asked on an- 
other occasion. It was six months later. “ Does it 
trouble you ?” 

“No.” 

“ Has it been extirpated ?” 

He looked at me for a few moments, a serious 
expression gathering on his face, and then replied : 
“ It would be about as safe for me to put a pistol to 
my head as a glass to my lips. Appetite is not 
dead ; it has only been removed from the seat of 
power, and made passive and subordinate. I give it 
no opportunity. I resist its slightest effort to rise. 


AS BY FIRE. 


235 

and hold its indulgence as a sin which I dare not 
commit.” 

“When its motions are felt, how do you resist 
them ?” 

“As I would resist a temptation to steal or commit 
murder or any other sin against God. I turn my 
thought from the image or allurement, and hold 
myself free from action. If temptation presses, I 
lift my heart and say, ‘ Lord, deliver me from evil;’ 
and He does deliver me.” 

“ Do you often have these temptations ?” I asked. 

“ Their assaults are growing less and less frequent, 
and less and less violent. But I make it a rule to 
keep away as far from the enemy’s ground as possi- 
ble. Invitations to public dinners, where liquor is 
served, I rarely, if ever, accept. And I am as chary of 
private entertainments, where wine is too often more 
freely dispensed than water. Nothing would tempt 
me to go inside of a drinking saloon, unless it were 
in order to save some fallen brother, and then my 
good purpose would be a panoply of defence.” 

“ Do you never expect to have this appetite wholly 
removed ?” 

“ What may come in the future is more than I 
can say. But safe abiding to the end is what I 
desire, and I do not mean to fail through any over- 
weening confidence in the utter extinction of this 
appetite.” 

“ Do you not believe that God will take it away 
in answer to prayer — take it away by an act of 


236 


SAVED 


grace, and without any resistance to the demands of 
appetite, or co-operation of any kind on your part ?” 

“No, I do not believe anything of the kind. I 
have met with some who held such a view, and who 
spoke confidently as to themselves; but I have 
always regarded them as being in more danger than 
others. I cannot understand how it is possible for 
God to save a man who makes no effort to save him- 
self. I have seen quite a number of cases in the last 
year, where men professed to be cleansed from all 
sin, drunkenness included, in a moment of time, and 
simply in answer to prayer. It did not take a great 
while to make it manifest that the old Adam was 
about as strong in them as before. Some of them 
led better lives, and were able to keep free from 
drunkenness ; but it was not because their evil in- 
clinations had been removed in answer to prayer and 
faith, but because they began fighting them, and 
looking to God as they fought, and overcoming 
through the Divine power that is given to all who 
will take it. Regeneration is a slow and gradual 
work ; not the sudden creation of a new spiritual 
man with all of his affection in Heaven. This higher 
life is not attained through faith and prayer, but 
through combat against the evils that are in the hu- 
man heart. The Church is militant. 

‘ Must I be carried to the skies 
On flowery beds of ease, 

While others fought to win the prize, 

Or sailed through bloody seas ? 


AS BY FIRE, 


237 


* Sure I must fight, if I would reign ; 

Increase my courage, Lord. 

I’ll bear the cross, endure the pain. 

Supported by Thy Word.’ 

“ Fight against what ? The world, the flesh and 
the devil. Where? In our hearts; for nowhere 
else can they assail or do us harm ; and with God 
on one side, and the Divine power of His Word 
from which to take sword and shield, we may be 
invincible if we will — Christian soldiers, fighting 
our way to Heaven ; not weak spiritual babes, borne 
thither in supporting arms, and of little use when 
we get there.” 

Granger had been thinking, living and growing 
more than I had thought. I saw in clearer light the 
ground of his safety. He was not a mere professor, 
trusting for salvation in some ideal purification, or 
resting satisfied in simple church-membership ; but 
an earnest inner-living and outer-working Christian 
man, who could give a reason which other men’s 
reason might apprehend for the hope that was in 
him. 

From this time my concern for Granger decreased ; 
for I understood better wherein his strength lay. He 
was living a new life, obedient to Divine laws, in the 
higher and more interior regions of his mind ; and 
this new life, or new spiritual man, born from above 
“ of water and of the Spirit ” — was ruling over the 
old natural life and holding it in orderly subjection. 
With him, reason and faith had become harmonized. 


238 


SAVED 


He was not walking blindly, nor in any false secu- 
rity, trusting in some dogma he could not under- 
stand ; but in a clear spiritual light — a thinking as 
well as a believing Christian. With him, faith was 
the “ evidence of things not seen and this faith, or 
evidence, had two foundations to rest upon, the 
Divine Law, and the reason which God had given 
him for the apprehension of that Law. “ A blind 
faith is worth nothing — is no faith at all,” he would 
say. “ Is, in fact, spiritual blindness. But Christ 
came to open the eyes of the spiritually blind that 
they might see, and discern the weightier things of 
His law — judgment, mercy and faith — in the keep- 
ing of which salvation is alone to be found.” 

“ The whole theory of religion is embraced in this 
simple precept,” he once said to me : “ Cease to do 
evil because it is sin, and therefore contrary to the 
Divine Law. When a man does this, he makes an 
effort to obey God ; and obedience is higher than 
faith and more effectual than sacrifice. Just as soon 
as a man begins to shun the evils to which he is in- 
clined, because to do them would be sin, God begins 
in him the work of purification, and gives him 
strength for still further resistance. This is true 
saving faith ; for it is the faith of obedience — the 
faith that looks humbly to God, trusts in Him and 
seeks to do His will. The first effort may be very 
feeble, but if it be a true effort. Divine strength will 
flow into it ; and then he will have an almost imme- 
diate sense of deliverance, followed by a season of 


AS BY FIRE. 


239 


rest and peace. The dangers of this first state are 
many. In the parable of the Sower, our Lord has 
declared them. Only they ‘which, in an honest and 
good heart,, having heard the Word, keep it, and 
bring forth fruit with patience’ — the fruit of right 
living — can attain to the kingdom. Too many err 
in mistaking this first delight, when the springing 
blade feels the refreshing airs and warm sunshine of 
heaven, for the later harvest time. With them the 
good seed has fallen in stony places or among thorns. 
Alas ! that we have so many of these.” 

Mr. Granger’s interest in the cause of temperance 
grew as he continued to devote all the time he could 
spare from his profession to the work of its exten- 
sion. When, two years after his reformation, that 
remarkable movement known as the “ Woman’s 
Crusade,” began ‘in Ohio, and spread with the 
rapidity of a prairie fire from town to town and State 
to State, until it reached almost every city and ham- 
let in the land, he gave it such aid and approval as 
lay in his power. I was surprised at this, and said 
so frankly. 

“ It is a mere outbreak of wild enthusiasm,” I re- 
marked, “ and will die as suddenly as it has flamed 
up. And, moreover, those who are engaged in it 
are acting in violation of law, and order, and the 
sacredness of individual rights.” 

He waited for a little while before answering me, 
and then said: “I have watched this movement, 
and thought about it a great deal, and I must own 


240 


SA VED 


that it has stirred my heart profoundly. There is 
something deeper in it than I am yet able clearly to 
comprehend. That its effects are marvelous no one 
can deny — and good as well as marvelous. If pray- 
ing with and for saloon-keepers, in or out of their 
bar-rooms, will induce them to abandon their deadly 
traffic, then I say ‘ God-speed !’ to those who see in 
this way of fighting the common enemy their line 
of duty. If praying will shut the doors of all the 
saloons in a town, by all means let prayer be 
tried.” 

“ But is it really prayer that does the work ?” 

“ Prayer is certainly the chief agency. No one 
can question that.” 

“ You believe, then, that because a praying band 
of women kneel down in a saloon and pray to God 
to turn the heart of the keeper atv^ay from his evil 
work and lead him to abandon it, that God answers 
their prayers and converts the saloon-keeper ?” 

“You have the facts of such conversions before 
you ; and they are not a few. How will you explain 
them ?” 

“ I confess myself at fault. But I do not believe 
that God was any the less inclined to convert the 
saloon-keeper, and lead him to abandon his work of 
destroying men, soul and body, before the. women 
prayed, than He was afterwards.” 

“ Perhaps not. Indeed, I am sure He was not. 
God’s love for the human race is infinite, and cannot 
therefore gain any increase through man’s interces- 


AS BY FIRE. 


241 


sion. If He waits to be entreated, it is for the 
entreaty that shall change man’s attitude towards 
Him, not His attitude to man. And herein I take 
it lies the value and the power of prayer.” 

“ But how can the prayers of a band of women 
change a saloon-keeper’s attitude towards God ?” I 
asked. ’ “ He doesn’t pray, but actually sets himself 
against prayer. Instead of looking to God, he re- 
jects Him.” 

“ All that is effected by prayer we cannot know,” 
Granger replied ; “for its influence is in the region 
of things invisible to mortal eyes. We understand 
but little of the laws that govern spiritual forces ; 
but that they are as unerring in their operations as 
any law of nature, we may safely conclude.” 

Mr. Stannard joined us here, and, learning the 
subject of our conversation, said : “ If you will re- 
flect a little, I think you will see that there must be 
a kind of spiritual medium or atmosphere on which 
our thoughts and feelings pass in some mysterious 
way from one to another, as light and sound are 
transmitted by our common atmosphere. Let us 
suppose, by way of illustration, that a mother is 
thinking intently of her absent son, and her heart 
at the same time going out lovingly towards him. Or, 
let us suppose that she feels deep concern for his 
spiritual state, and is praying earnestly that he may 
turn from the evil of his ways and give his heart to 
God. Now, will not her thought of her son reach 
him on some medium of transmission too subtle ti 


242 


SAVED 


be perceived by our grosser senses, and so make her 
present to his thoughts ? And will not the loving 
concern which is affecting her so deeply reach him 
at the same time, and open his heart to the heavenly 
influences which have been waiting, it may be for 
years, at the shut door, for an opportunity to come 
in ? God has not changed. He has not waited for 
the mother’s prayers to reach Him before He will 
save her son ; but the mother’s prayers have affected 
the son, and revived, it may be, old states of inno- 
cence, or reverence for God, or thoughts of love and 
duty into which angelic impulses might flow, and 
the Spirit of God take hold, and through them 
quicken the sleeping conscience. 

“ There is a doctrine, which, if true — and I think 
it must be true — throws a strong light on this sub- 
ject, and explains the phenomena of what are re- 
garded as answers to prayer. It is this: From 
infancy up to mature years, the Lord continually 
provides for the storing up in the memory of pure, 
and true, and innocent things — such as various states 
of innocence and charity ; of love towards relatives, 
brothers and sisters, teachers and friends ; of mercy 
toward the poor and needy, and kindness towards all. 
When infancy is passed, and the mind begins to 
open, then, as far as it is possible to be done, the 
Lord provides that some precepts of life be stored 
up, as duty to the Lord and the neighbor, and also 
knowelge of faith. These remain protected in the 
inner memory, as the things by which the Lord can 


AS BY FIRE. 


243 


operate with man after he arrives at the age of free- 
dom and rationality ; and it is by means of these 
that He lifts him out of his inherited evil affections, 
and leads him heavenward.” 

“A most important doctrine, if true,” I said. “But 
I am not able to see how it explains the phenomena 
of answers to prayer.” 

“ Suppose,” replied Mr. Stannard, “ we take the 
case of a saloon-keeper in whose memory, hidden 
away and covered up for years, have lain some of 
these innocent, and tender, and merciful states, 
stored there in childhood through the loving care of 
a mother. The Lord has been very watchful over 
them ; and has kept them hidden and safe in some 
closely-sealed chamber, lest the evil things of his 
evil life should destroy them. Not one of these 
states has been lost ; not a good or true precept erased 
from the book of his memory — they have only been 
kept away from his consciousness while he immersed 
himself in evil, so that they might not be rejected 
and lost. This man is in his bar-room. The door 
opens, and half a dozen women enter. The moment 
he sees them, his anger flames out, and he launches 
frightful oaths and vile imprecations against them. 
But the women are in earnest. They believe in the 
power of prayer, and are going to try its influence 
here. As they pass into the saloon, the clear, sweet 
voice of the leader swells out, and for the first time 
in a dozen years, it may be, there breaks on the 
man’s ears the words, ‘All hail the power of Jesus’ 


244 


SAVED 


name !’ It does not need the chorus of voices that 
take up the words and music to drown his impreca- 
tions. They have already died on his lips. What 
a strange feeling has come over him! Where is he? 
In the old village church, listening to his mother’s 
or sister’s voice in the choir ? The Lord has ever 
been very near to him, though unseen and unknown, 
waiting for an opportunity like this. How still he 
stands, listening and bending a little forward towards 
the singers ! And now, in the strange hush that 
follows, the women kneel, and one of them lifts her 
voice, speaking to God reverently, and asking Him 
to touch and soften the heart of this man, who has 
forgotten the loving precepts of his mother and the 
God whom she served, and who has given himself 
to the work of destroying his fellow-men. ‘ Have 
pity on him. Lord !’ she says, in pleading tones ; 
‘ for the hurt to himself will be deeper than the hurt 
to his neighbor. By the memory of his mother’s 
love, of his pure and innocent childhood, of the 
prayers that came once from his sweet, baby lips, 
touch and soften his heart, and turn it to higher and 
better and holier things.’ Ho you wonder, as the 
women rise, and commence singing ‘Nearer my God 
to Thee,’ that the bowed head of the saloon-keeper 
is not raised ; that his eyes are dim, if not blinded 
by tears ? Do you wonder that conviction of sin 
strikes him to the heart ; or that, under these influ- 
ences, quickened and strengthened by the Spirit 
of God, which has found an opportunity in this 


AS BY FIRE. 


245 


stirring of old memories and revival of old states, 
lie is filled with such a horror of his old life, and 
such soK’ow for the evil he has done, that he re- 
solves, through God’s help, to be a new and a better 
man ? 

“Now, what did prayer effect in this case? Did 
God soften and change the heart of this man in 
answer to the prayers that were offered in his saloon ; 
or, were these prayers the agency by which God’s 
Spirit was able to reach his heart and vivify the 
remains of innocent, and good, and holy things 
which, through the Divine mercy, had been stored 
up in childhood and youth, and kept hidden away 
and safe from destruction? I cannot comprehend how 
the first could be. The last is clear to my appre- 
hension. The first makes God seem worse than 
indifferent. Souls may perish by myriads if no one 
will make intercession for them. He will not stoop 
to save unless supplication be offered. But in the 
latter view. He is forever bending down, merciful 
and compassionate; forever reaching out His hands ; 
forever providing the means of salvation; forever 
seeking to save that which is lost. Prayer becomes 
a more powerful agent, in so far as its rationale is 
seen. Faith is not diminished, but made stronger. 
We need not ask God to be gracious ; to turn away 
His anger ; to be pitiful and compassionate — for He 
is as much more loving, and pitiful, and compas- 
sionate, than any man or angel, as the infinite is 
greater than the finite. But we may feel sure, if we 


246 


SAVED 


pray from the heart for submission to the Divine 
will ; for patience, and humility, and strength for 
duty and self-denial, that our prayers will he an- 
swered, in the degree that they are offered in spirit 
and in truth.” 

“ But our prayers for others,” said Mr, Granger ; 
“ what form of intercession shall we use for them ? 
How shall we make them avail for good ? This is 
now the important question.” 

“ Let each pray out of the fullness of his heart,” 
Mr. Stannard replied. “ If it be with those whom 
we seek to influence and turn from evil to God, the 
effect will he more marked, and often attended with 
more favorable results than when we pray for the 
absent and the unseen. Our voices and tones, and 
the words we speak, are heard by those for whom we 
thus pray, and more quickly penetrate the locked 
chambers of the soul, where the Lord has been 
keeping the remnant of precious things which has 
been left from infancy and childhood, and by the 
quickening and life of which. He can save their souls 
from sin. And let us not fail to pray for the absent 
in whom our interest has been awakened ; for our 
beloved ones; for any and all towards whom our 
hearts are yearning. And, as we pray, let us think 
of them intently, so that we may come nearer to 
them in spirit, and our thought of God bring the 
thought of Him into their minds, so that He may 
be able to stir in their hearts the motions of a better 
life. The Lord is not waiting for our prayers to 


AS BY FIRE. 


247 


avail with Him that He may do this.; but for our 
prayers, it may be, as the only means by which 
the doors of their hearts can be opened to let Him 
come in.” 


CHAPTER XVII. 


HELP IN PEAYEE. 

T he “ Crusade,” as it was called, went on ; and 
for awhile the whole country was in a state of 
wondering excitement. . Thousands of saloons were 
closed, and in many towns the traffic in intoxicating 
liquor ceased altogether. Brewers, especially in some 
of the larger western cities, took the alarm, as well 
they might, for the sale of beer had diminished so 
rapidly that the fear of ruin began to stare them in 
the face. At Cincinnati, Chicago and St. Louis, so 
heavy a loss was suffered in the internal revenue 
from malt liquors that Government officials became 
much disturbed in consequence. 

And still the Crusade went on. But now the 
surprised and discomfited enemy began to rally his 
scattered forces. In some of the smaller towns he 
had fought desperately ; but only with partial suc- 
cess in a few cases. Except in the larger cities, he 
had been sorely hurt, or vanquished altogether. 
But here, he was able to make his first sure stand, 
and to begin striking back with an effective force 
that restored his confidence. The aid of the press 
was invoked; appeals made to the law; fines im- 
posed, and the interference and protection of local 
governments demanded. Praying in saloons was 

248 


AS BY FIRE. 


249 


declared to be a nuisance, if not a crime against 
social order ; and the assembling of women in the 
streets for singing and prayer was fordidden because 
it led to riot. In Cincinnati, Cleveland and other 
cities, disgraceful attacks were made by brutal men 
on some of the praying bands ; and in a few cases 
Christian women were arrested and sent to prison. 

Almost as suddenly as this strange, intense and 
irresistible impulse had risen, gained strength and 
swept over the land, did it seem to die away ; and 
the enemy said it was dead, and made rejoicings 
over its obsequies. The wise ones who knew from 
the beginning that it would speedily come to nought, 
were happy in their fancied prescience. As for 
myself, the result was scarcely different from what I 
had anticipated. The thing was abnormal, in my 
view, and could not last. Merely an impulse — ^wild 
and strong — which must die from exhaustion. But 
my sympathies had been all on the side of the 
movement ; and there were times when the irresist- 
ible strength of its onward rush had led me to 
question whether some new spiritual force had not 
been evolved, through the agency of these praying 
women, which was destined to sweep this fearful 
curse of intemperance from our land. 

But the seeming collapse of the movement left 
my mind free to drift back among former ideas and 
impressions, and even to take up the belief that as a 
result of this wild impulse, there would follow a 
corresponding indifference and supineness. 

16 


250 


SAVED 


“ What do you think of the woman’s movement 
now ?” I asked of Mr. Granger, who had made seve- ‘ 
ral public addresses while the excitement was at its 
height in our city, and in act, as well as speech, given 
it both aid and sympathy. “ I was afraid of this,” 
I added, before he had time to answer my question. 

“ Afraid of what ?” he inquired. 

“ Of its utter collapse. A little while ago, and it 
was the great sensation of the day. The columns 
of our most influential and most widely-circulating 
newspapers were teeming with its marvels and its 
achievements. To-day, there is scarcely to he found 
in any of them so much as a paragraph an inch 
long to tell of its dying throes.” 

“ And yet,” he answered, speaking with an earn- 
estness that surprised me, “ this woman’s movement 
was never so strong, and deep, and efiective as it is 
to-day.” 

“ I do not see the evidence,” I replied. 

“There is more real strength in unobtrusive, 
thoughtful, well-organized effort, than in the impetu- 
ous sweep of high-wrought impulse,” said Granger. 

“ In this great pioneer movement, this wild rush of 
wronged, and in many cases, heart-broken and des- 
perate women, as, losing faith and hope in man, they 
sprang upon their deadly foe with a bitter cry to 
God for help, there came to them a revelation of the 
true sources of their power. The Lord answered 
them in the still, small voice, that grew clear, and 
sweet, and full of comfort and assurance as the noise 


AS BY FIRE. 


251 


of the whirlwind which had rent the mountain grew 
silent on the expectant air. In prayer they had 
found a weapon which, if rightly used, would make 
them invincible. Should they throw it away in 
despair, because in the very first great trial their 
hands had struck a little wildly, and the maddened 
foe seemed pushing them in consequence to a small 
disadvantage ? Not so. They had heard the still, 
small voice, and knew it to be the voice of their 
Lord. If the prayers of a few hundreds, or a few 
thousands of Christian women could etfect so much, 
what might not be done through the united prayers 
of tens and hundreds of thousands of such, women, 
going up in concert from every city, town, village 
and neighborhood in the land ? Here was a ques- 
tion full of significance and large with promise ; and 
this is the question to which some of the best and 
most thoughtful women of our country are giving an 
earnest consideration to-day. But their hands are 
not resting while they consider it ; nor is the sword 
by which they mean to have the victory lying idle 
in its scabbard. Neither prayer nor work among 
saloon-keepers and their families, and among their 
wretched victims, has ceased because the press no 
longer makes record of the fact ; nor are the results 
less wide and cheering because the general public 
remains unadvised.” 

“ Have you evidence of all this ?” I asked, not 
concealing my astonishment. 

“ Abundant.” 


252 


SAVED 


“ And the work of praying in saloons still goes 
on?” 

“No. That has ceased almost entirely. It was 
only a pioneer movement — a first wild rush upon 
the enemy and trial of his strength and resources. 
He is not only able to guard himself in this direc- 
tion, but to weaken and divide the forces of his as- 
sailants if the advance is made upon him here. Or- 
ganization, drill, discipline, wise generalship, a 
knowledge of the laws that govern in attack and 
defence ; all these are in progress and being gained 
now.” 

“While the enemy, warned by his brief dis- 
comfiture, will entrench himself more securely,” 
said I. 

Granger smiled. “In war the resources of attack 
gain perpetually on defense. To be invincible is to 
be exceptional. Our women are already getting their 
siege guns in position, and organizing their sappers 
and miners. Their spies’ and scouts are busy ; weak 
places are being discovered, and new modes of as- 
sault adopted. Let me give you a single instance 
connected with the present state of the war in our 
own city, which has never been intermitted. There 
was a certain saloon-keeper who had repulsed a 
praying band with considerable rudeness. He had 
a wife and two young daughters, amd a son in his 
twelfth year ; his family living a short distance from 
his bar-room. A committee of twelve women were 
selected to visit in the neighborhood, and do what 


AS BY FIRE. 


253 


lay in tlieir power as well to repress the evil of in- 
temperance as to guard the young from its fatal 
allurements. To visit and pray in saloons was no 
longer in their programme ; but to reach the saloon- 
keepers and get them to abandon their traffic was ; 
and to the work of doing this with the one I have 
mentioned they set themselves in sober earnest. 
Their first business was to learn all about him ; the 
character of his family, and the nature of his home 
relations. He was not a bad man, the neighbors said, 
and, when he did not drink too freely, was kind and 
indulgent. A visit by a single one of the ladies was 
now made. At first, the wife was cold and distant ; 
but the visitor was a woman with so much of the mag- 
netism of Christian charity in her soul, and withal, 
so wise and prudent of speech, that it was not long 
before the heart of the saloon-keeper’s wife opened 
to her, and the mother’s hidden concern for her boy 
and two young daughters became manifest. After 
a brief, carefully-worded prayer, the visitor went 
away, but not without asking if she might not call 
again, and receiving an invitation to do so. 

“ At her next visit, she got farther down into the 
woman’s heart and confidence, and was able to speak 
to her with some freedom about the danger that was 
in the path of her son — a danger it was scarcely pos- 
sible for him to escape if his feet continued therein. 
The mother wept at the picture of peril the lady 
drew, and said : ‘ Oh, if my husband were in some 
other business.’ The boy, a fine-looking lad, came 


254 


SAVED 


in while they were talking about him. The lady 
took his hand and spoke to him kindly, then drew 
her arm about him and asked if he went to Sunday- 
school. On his saying No, she told him that she 
had a class of nice little boys, and would be glad to 
have him among them. He was pleased with her 
notice, and touched by her gentle kindness. On the 
next Sunday the lad presented himself at school, 
and was taken into the lady’s class. He was very 
attentive and orderly, and promised to come again 
on the following Sunday. True to his promise, he 
was there, conducting himself with as much decorum 
and attention to his lessons as at first. A juvenile 
temperance meeting was held at the close of the 
school, and all who were not already members in- 
vited to join. A little to the surprise, and greatly 
to the lady’s delight, the boy came forward and en- 
rolled his name, receiving a card on which a pledge 
not to drink intoxicating liquors, or to give them 
away or traflfic in them, was printed. At the bottom 
he wrote his signature. 

“ Naturally a little anxious to know what efiect 
had been produced at home by this, and what the 
prospect of the boy’s being able to keep his pledge, 
the lady called to see the saloon-keeper’s wife near 
the close of the week, when she heard the following 
story : 

“ ‘ When John told me what he’d done, and showed 
me his pledge,' I was so glad ! And I kissed him, 
and I said : “You must keep it forever and forever. 


AS BY FIRE. 


255 


John.” And he said that that was just what he 
meant to do. I kept it from his father ; for I didn’t 
know just how he’d take it. It seemed like a reflec- 
tion on him. “John,” says his father, on Monday 
morning, as he was leaving, “ come along. I want 
you in the bar to-day. Peter’s going on an excur- 
sion, and I can’t be left all alone.” John’s face 
became right pale. He hadn’t moved when his 
father got to the door ; on seeing which, he called 
out sharply: “ Did you hear me ?” “You’ll have 
to go, John,” said I, in a whisper; for, you see, my 
husband’s quick, and I was afraid for the boy. So 
they went out, and I was dreadfully troubled about 
him. It was, maybe, an hour afterwards that John 
returned. He had a scared kind of look about him, 
as he came in. “What’s happened? Why have 
you come home ?” I asked. “ Father sent me home.” 
“ What for ?” “ Well, you see, mother, when Peter 

went, father told me that I must tend bar in his 
place; and then I said : ‘I’m sorry, father, but I’ve 
taken the pledge and can’t drink, nor give liquors 
away, nor sell it to anybody.’ ‘How dare you ! you 
young villain !’ he cried out ; and I was afraid he’d 
kncck me down, he looked so strange and wild like. 
Then he got red, and pale, and I thought once he 
was going to strangle, he breathed so hard, and then, 
as a customer came in, he said: ‘Off home with 
you !’ ” 

“ ‘ I didn’t see anything of my husband until late 
that night,’ continued the saloon-keeper’s wife. ‘ He 


256 


SAVED 


was alone in the bar and had to stay till business 
was over. I was sitting up for him, but John was 
in bed. He didn’t say a word ; but I noticed that 
be hadn’t been drinking, and that gave me a little 
heart. In the morning he met John at the break- 
fast-table. I had been dreading this meeting. He 
didn’t speak to him, but two or three times, as he sat 
eating in a silent, moody sort of way, I saw him 
steal a curious look at the boy’s face. He hadn’t 
half-finished his breakfast, it seemed to me, when he 
pushed his chair away, and says he : “ John, I want 
you !” and went out of the dining-room into the 
passage. John got almost white, but went out and 
shut the door after him. I felt dreadfully, for I 
didn’t know what was going to happen. In about a 
minute John came back alone. The color was all 
over his face now, and there was a great light in his 
eyes. “ Father says it’s best now that it’s done, and 
that he’ll expect me to keep it.” I was such a 
happy woman, and cried for joy. 

“ ‘And that isn’t all, ma’am,’ she went on. ‘ Some- 
how my husband can’t get over it ; and he’s spoken 
so kind to John ever since, and only last night he 
said : “ Jane, I wish I could see my way clear out of 
this business. I don’t like it at all.” Oh, if he 
only could get out of it !’ 

“ ‘ Let us pray that the Lord will make all plain 
before him,’ said the lady visitor. And then she 
knelt down with the woman and her two young 
‘daughters, and prayed for the husband and father 


AS BY FIRE. 


257 


with such earnestness of supplication that it seemed 
to them that God must and would hear and answer 
her prayers. And even while she prayed, led home 
by a Providence that was in this work, and governing 
its issues, the man stood at the very door of the room 
in which the petition went up, and heard every one of 
its carefully-chosen and reverently-uttered sentences. 
Did he enter the room all broken down ? No ; he 
went quietly away, giving no sign, but with an 
arrow of conviction in his heart. God had found a 
way of entrance, and was uncovering old memories 
and quickening old states, and calling to him from 
away down among the innocent things of his child- 
hood. And he was hearkening, and repenting, and 
desiring a truer and better life than the one he had 
been leading. It was not long before the change 
came ; for the good will is never long in finding the 
good way. In the work of destroying the souls and 
bodies of men there was one less ; and in the work 
of service and restoration one more. Nay, might I 
not say many more — for the duplication and increase 
of every man’s good or evil work is often very 
great.” 

“And is there much of this kind of work going 
on?” I asked. 

“ Yes,” he replied, “ and it is being gradually 
shaped into a system. Mistakes are being corrected; 
and the blind enthusiasm of too impetuous and 
strong-willed leaders repressed. The quiet intrusion 
that takes the enemy off guard is surer of victory 


258 


SAVED 


tliau the open attack for which the blast of a trum- 
pet has given warning to be ready. A besieged city 
that is proof against assault, may be reduced to capit- 
ulation through the cutting off of supplies. All this 
is being seen and understood. If neither by direct 
effort with a saloon-keeper, nor indirectly through 
his family, he can be induced to give up his hurtful 
business, then a thorough work of temperance re- 
form will be inaugurated in his neighborhood, and 
the profits of his business be reduced, and if possi- 
ble destroyed, through the loss of custom.” 

“ Temperance men and temperance organizations 
have been trying to do this very thing for over fifty 
years,” I replied, “ and the sale of liquor has in- 
creased instead of diminishing. So long as you have 
the saloons you will have the customers. My faith 
in this thorough work of temperance reform of which 
you speak, is not, I am free to say, very great. I 
well remember the rise and progress of that first 
great tidal wave of reform, known as Washington- 
ianism, which went sweeping over the land. Hun- 
dreds of thousands took the pledge in a brief period, 
and Ave looked for a great percentage of diminution 
in the traffic, if not its destruction altogether. But 
taverns and bar-rooms went on flourishing as of old. 
As that great Avave began to subside, another, and a 
feebler wave, that of Jeffersonianism, succeeded, and 
broke upon the rock-bound shores of license, and 
usage, and appetite, Avith scarcely a manifest im- 
pression. Then the Avork of a more general organi - 


AS BY FIRE. 


259 


zation began, and the order of the Sons of Temper- 
ance was established, and set itself to the task of 
resistance. The promise was very great. It looked 
* as if we were going to have, in every town and 
neighborhood, and in every city ward, a working 
force of temperance men, whose leading end and 
effort would be the extirpation of intemperance from 
their midst. But it was not so. Good work was 
done in many places ; and thousands were protected 
and saved through pledges and associations, but the 
lodge meetings fostered a love of social ease and en- 
joyment, and steadily diminished the aggressive 
force of the organization. Then the Good Templars 
came to the front, and associated women in the work 
and administration of the order. But the same gen- 
eral causes which had wrought their enervating effects 
on the Sons of Temperance, were in operation with 
the Templars and kindred organizations as well. 
Love of office and of power and influence crept in, 
as they usually do where there are titles and honors 
and distinctions, and were of more account with 
many than the high purpose of the order itself. 
And so the work of temperance languished, and the 
enemy v/ent on increasing in strength and confidence. 
What better promise now ? What is to make this 
movement any more permanent than those which 
have gone before it ? Human nature is the same. 
Enthusiasm will die of exhaustion, and the weari- 
ness in well-doing, which is sure to come, sooner or 
later, make idle tlie hands that' are now so busy. 


260 


SAVED 


Tliis reform work is so slow. We scarcely perceive 
its progress, and are often in doubt whether the 
movement be retrograde or onward. I must own to 
having more faith in legal than in moral suasion ; in 
Maine Laws than in pledges.” 

“ You forgot the new element,” said Granger. 

“ What?” 

“ Prayer.” 

“ Yes, I had forgotten.” 

“ This is a religious as well as a temperance move- 
ment.” 

“True.” 

“And the effort is not merely to save men and 
women from the sin of drunkenness, but from all 
other sins. It is on a higher plane, and nearer the 
true sources of power. There is less of self in it, 
and more of God.” 

Granger spoke with great seriousness ; and I saw 
that he had strong faith in the results of this new 
effort to organize a force that should have larger 
success than any which had hitherto set itself to do 
battle with intemperance. 



CHAPTER XVIII. 


GOSPEL TEMPERANCE WORK. 

T he work of “ Gospel Temperance,” as some 
began to call this latest effort to weaken and 
destroy the monster evil which had so long cursed 
the land, had a steady growth. Pious women in all 
the churches began to take part in it, and to 
strengthen its effective agencies. Prayer was inces- 
sant, and trusted in with implicit confidence. There 
was a literal acceptance of the promise, “That if 
two of you shall agree upon earth as touching any- 
thing that they shall ask, it shall be done for them 
of my Father which is in Heaven.” They believed 
in the faith that removes mountains ; and in the 
Word of Him who said, “Ask and ye shall receive; 
seek and ye shall find ; knock and it shall be opened 
unto you.” And when they met in His name, they 
had an assurance that He was in the midst of them. 
They were consecrating themselves to the work of 
saving souls that were well-nigh lost. Souls so far 
out of the reach of common Gospel influences, that 
even the churches had practically ceased to regiird 
them as within the pale of salvation, and knew that 
God’s power to save could be given them in the 
largest measure ; for were not these souls, so fearfully 
imperilled, as precious to Him as the souls of any 
in His whole universe ? 

261 


262 


SAVED 


Never had the poor, degraded, suffering drunkard 
met, since his sad debasement, with such influences 
as came to him now. “ My brother ” fell on his ears 
in a voice so tender and compassionate, that feelings, 
which had lain dormant for years, stirred in his 
heart once more. A hand was laid on him so gently 
and kindly, that it seemed like the hand of a sister, 
or a wife, or a mother, felt in the long ago. And 
when prayer was offered for him, and he felt him- 
self borne up to the throne of grace on the sweet, 
and tender, and pleading voices of gentle women, 
he broke all down, and under the suddenly-kindled 
hope of being rescued from his sin and misery, he 
lifted his poor, broken spirit to God and prayed for 
help, and mercy, and forgiveness. 

Differ as we may about the philosophy of prayer, 
and the true sources of its power, of one thing we may 
be sure, that the ear of God is open to the cry of every 
sin-sick soul, if it is made in sincerity and in trutli. 
As to the answer, that will depend on the measure of 
the willingness to receive. The love and the boun- 
tifulness are infinite The cry of the lips will bring 
nothing; the cry of the heart everything it is capable 
of receiving ; and its capacity will always be equal to 
the displacement of evil in the life, because such evil 
is contrary to God’s will and Word, and obstructs 
His influent love. The growth in grace, from the 
first moment the soul turns to God in prayer, and 
makes its first sincere effort to lead a new spiritual 
life, will be in an exact ratio to its resistance and 


AS BY FIRE. 263 

conquest of evil on the plane of its natural life in 
the world and among men. 

Prayer, in the hands of these women, wrought 
marvels. Men who had been drunkards for years, 
stopped suddenly, professed faith in Christ, joined 
the church, and became once more good and useful 
citizens. So quietly was all this done, in the second 
stage of this Gospel temperance work, that the 
general public heard little about it, and knew less. 
But the seed was being sown broadcast, and in due 
time the promise of an ampler harvest than had yet 
been seen was apparent on every side. Many men 
who had become reformed through the ministry of 
prayer, threw themselves into the work of rescuing 
the fallen ; going from town to town, and by their 
eloquent appeals, stirring the hearts of the people, 
and arousing them to a sense of their duty and their 
danger. 

. And now, one after another, the slumbering 
churches began to awake and to recognize the hand 
of God in this work, and to give it countenance and 
approval, if not the practical support it yet so largely 
needed. But the work itself went on chiefly outside 
of the churches, though in the hands of the most 
active and earnest Christian men and women con- 
nected with the churches ; for it was nearer to hu- 
manity than to sectarian conservatism, and drew to its 
aid those who had in them the larger measure of that 
Christianity which stoops, as Christ stoops, to the 
lowest and the vilest, if in so doing he may save them. 


264 


SAVED 


“ I do not understand this strange indifference of 
the churches,” said I, to Granger, one day. “ In 
temperance work, they are doing little or nothing ; 
and they might be doing so much.” 

“There are signs of better things,” he replied. 
“ Let us be patient for awhile. The time is not far 
off, I trust, when every society that calls itself a 
church, will have its special praying and working 
band of women, and an open door for the lowest 
and the vilest to come in ; when the heathen who 
are perishing in the very shadow of its porches will 
take precedence of the heathen afar off. We have 
cheering intelligence from all sides. Almost every 
day we hear of new workers coming into the field, 
and of successes everywhere. In some places, from 
one-third to two-thirds of the whole population have 
signed the pledge, to the joy of good citizens and 
the consternation of liquor-dealers.” 

“ If we could have anything like that in our poor, 
rum-cursed city !” I replied. “ But hope is vain. In 
smaller communities, where each is known to all, 
and a chain of interest and personal influence holds 
the people in nearer contact, a common sentiment or 
impulse may bear them in a single direction. But 
it is not so here. Set any force you please in motion, 
and its impression can only be partial.” 

“We hope for a widely different result,” Granger 
made answer. “ Next week a man whose power 
with the people is almost a marvel and a mystery, 
will come from the West to our city ; and then an 


A8 BY FIRE. 


265 


effort will be made, through daily and nightly relig- 
ious meetings, to get up such a temperance revival 
as has never been seen or heard of in the land.” 

I smiled at his ardor. He had become almost an 
enthusiast on the subject of temperance. 

“ We shall see,” was my doubting response. 

And we did see. The man came — this new apostle 
of temperance. He was not learned, but had largely 
the gift of persuasion ; was not so eloquent as ready 
of speech ; not so logical as impassioned ; moved his 
audiences not so much by the clearness of a well- 
considered argument, as by the force of fact and in- 
cident. He was easy of manner, and at home with 
the people; recognizing in the lowliest and most 
wretched a brother, and telling the poor drunkard, 
whose hand he held so tightly, that he knew all 
about the pit in which his feet were mired, and all 
about the way of deliverance. “As God saved me, my 
brother. He will save you,” was ever spoken with 
that sympathy and assurance which gives speech 
a passage to the heart. From the very commence- 
ment of his work, Francis Murphy exercised an 
influence that to some appeared half-miraculous. 
The halls in which his meetings in our city were 
held, were crowded night after night to overflowing, 
hundreds being unable to gain access. In the 
conduct of these meetings, there were no particu- 
larly remarkable features. They were opened with 
the reading of Scripture and prayer, followed by 
singing. Then there would be addresses from 
17 


266 


SAVED 


clergymen and others, including Mr. Murphy ; and 
speeches and experiences from reformed men — the 
whole interspersed with the singing of temperance 
and revival hymns. During the progress of the 
meetings, and at their close, invitations to come and 
sign the pledge were given and responded to, very 
many coming forward each night and taking the 
pledge of total abstinence; the number soon in- 
creasing from hundreds to thousands. Men would 
enter the hall so badly intoxicated that they could 
scarcely walk straight, and before leaving sign their 
names to a pledge, and in many cases keep it. It 
was not with poor, degraded wretches alone — the 
outcast and the abandoned — that these meetings 
had power. Men of standing and education, who 
\V,ere beginning to feel the strength of an appetite 
that too surely betrays to ruin ; lawyers, mer- 
chants, physicians ; the representatives of all con- 
ditions and classes — alike felt the warning or the 
persuasion that came to them, and alike took 
heed. 

“ Will it last ?” was my question after the weeks 
had begun gathering into months. 

“ Does not my good friend live too close to 
Doubting Castle?” returned Granger, to whom I 
had addressed the inquiry. He was already deeply 
absorbed in the exciting movement. 

“ Perhaps. But we hear of things being too good 
to last, you know.” 

“ Things may be too bad to last ; but never too 


good. It is only the good that is really substan- 
tial,” he returned, smiling. 

“ The good will last, of course. But how much 
is really genuine in all this, and how much facti- 
tious ? Of the scores who nightly sign the pledge, 
and are pointed to God as the One who alone can 
give them strength to keep it, how many do you 
think will stand ?” 

“ God only knows,” he replied, a little soberly, 
and with, I thought, a slight disturbance in his 
manner. 

“A suddenly inspired good resolution ; a cry to 
God for help ; the impression of an inner change 
which may he nothing more than a feeling; the 
signing of a pledge — all the work of a minute, it 
may he ; are these to be relied upon with any well- 
grounded assurance ?” I said. “ The man is here to- 
night in the sphere of an excitement that moves him 
deeply. He sees, as he has not seen for a long time, 
his sin and wretchedness ; the pain and loss to him- 
self, and the. wrongs and sufferings of those who 
love him or are dependent on him. And he sees, 
too, a way of escape, and hands reached out with a 
promise of help. He signs the pledge, and tries to 
look up and pray. Hopeful words are spoken in 
his ears. He is pointed, in a few words, to Christ 
as his Saviour. And then he goes out alone, hungry, 
it may be, and homeless, to sleep in the street or 
station-house. What hope for him, with his ex- 
hausted nerves and gnawing thirst? He wants more 


268 


SAVED 


than pledge or prayer ; he wants good food, shelter 
and protection ; and, until he can stand alone, a 
hand to hold him up ; and if these are not given, it 
were about as well to let him alone.” 

As I spoke, I saw the shadows that were falling 
over Granger’s face grow deeper. 

“ We have not forgotten this,” he replied. “We 
have a relief committee, and are doing what we can. 
Every Sunday morning, a breakfast is provided. 
Clothing, as far as we are able to procure it, is dis- 
tributed, employment obtained, and all the protec- 
tion in our power to throw about the men who are 
trying to reform. But the work is taking on dimen- 
sions so far beyond what we had anticipated, that 
we find ourselves without sufficient means for its 
thorough prosecution. We give our time, our efforts 
and our money; but we who are active in this move- 
ment are few compared with the thousands who 
stand looking on, wondering, approving, doubting or 
criticising. ‘What is a Sunday-morning breakfast?’ 
said a gentleman only to-day. ‘ Can a man live on 
a single meal a week ?’ But when I asked him to 
give us money, that we might minister more largely, 
his answer was that he knew where better to dis- 
pense his charity. Perhaps he did, and I shall not 
judge him. ‘ It isn’t so much praying, as food and 
clothing and employment that are needed,’ said an- 
other. ‘ If there were less talking and canting, and 
more good, solid doing for these poor wretches, the 
chances in their favor would be increased ten to one.’ 


AS BY FIRE. 


269 


And yet I could not so interest him in their behalf 
as to get from him either personal or material aid.” 

There was an undertone of trouble in Granger’s - 
voice, which fell to a heavy sigh in the closing words 
of his last sentence. 

“ From four to five hundred destitute men seeking 
aid,” he resumed, “ and our resources utterly inade- 
quate to the demands that are made upon us — hun- 
gry, half-clothed, and in too many cases, homeless 
men. We may arrest their feet by Gospel means ; 
hut if we would turn their steps into the ways of 
sobriety and hold them there, we must meet and care 
for them on a lower plane. If we would lift them 
into spiritual safety, we must get the foundations of 
natural life secure. An empty stomach, and soiled 
and ragged and scanty clothing, with idleness super- 
added, are not, I agree with you, favorable to the 
growth of true piety. The struggle with this dread- 
ful appetite is hard enough under the most favorable 
conditions; and, therefore, our work must be re- 
garded as only initiated when, by force of these new 
spiritual influences, we have been able to draw the 
unhappy victims of intemperance over from the 
enemy’s ground.” 

As we talked a man entered — I was sitting in Mr. 
Granger’s office — and came forward in a hesitating, 
half-embarrassed manner. His clothing was poor 
and soiled, his person unsightly, and his face that of 
an exhausted inebriate. He stopped when a few 
steps from us, and said : “ You do not know me.” 


270 


SAVED 


We both recognized him by his voice. He had 
been a conveyancer, and a man with some property; 
but intemperate habits had done for him what they 
too surely accomplish for nearly all who indulge 
them. 

‘‘Yes, I know you. Hartley,” Granger answered, 
quickly, rising as he spoke, and grasping the man’s 
hand. He held it for some moments, looking in- 
tently into his face. “ Didn’t I see you at the meet- 
ing in Broad Street, last night ?” he asked, while 
still holding his hand. 

“ Yes, I was there.” 

“And you signed the pledge ?” 

“ Yes, sir. After I heard you speak, I said, if 
God can save Granger, He can save me, and I’m 
going to try this new way.” 

God can and will save you, my friend,” was 
Granger’s warm response. “Sit down and let us 
talk about it.” 

He drew Hartley into a chair, and sat down in 
front of him. 

“ Now, tell me all about yourself.” There was a 
genuine interest in his voice ; and its effect upon 
this poor wreck of a man, was to send a glow^ to his 
face, and cause his dull eyes to kindle. “ How is it 
with you : and what the chances are for getting on 
your feet again. Tell me all about it. You signed 
the pledge la^t night ?” 

“ Yes, I signed at the meeting in Broad Street. 
And you were standing just in front of me, and 


AS BY FIRE. 


271 


looking at me; and I heard you say, ‘Trust in God, 
my brother. Look to Him, and pray to Him, and 
He will give you strength to keep this pledge.’ You 
said it to me ; but I saw that you didn’t know me. 
I wanted to speak to you, and to tell you who I was; 
and I was pressing forward when some one drew you 
away, and then I couldnit get near you again. I 
waited at the door until you came out; but you were 
talking with a gentleman, and while I hesitated about 
interrupting you, you. passed down the street, and I 
was left standing alone.” 

“ Where did you go after that ?” asked Granger. 

“ I had nowhere to go. In this whole city, there 
was no place that I could call my home — no house 
in which I could claim the right to lay my head. 
My wife died three years ago ; and my only child is 
with my mother, who lives in a neighboring town. 
I am alone and friendless.” 

“No; not friendless,” said Granger, his voice 
struggling with his feelings. “ There is One who 
sticketh closer than a brother. He is your friend.” 

The poor man looked down at his wretched gar- 
ments in a way that it was not hard to understand. 
His face did not brighten perceptibly under this last 
assurance. 

“ Where did you sleep last night ?” I inquired. 

“ I would have gone to one of the police-stations, 
but was afraid of being sent to the House of Correc- 
tion. You see I had taken the pledge, and in a new 
way, and I was going to try to keep it, if God would 


272 


SAVED 


indeed help me, as it kept coming to me that He 
would. So I walked out to Fairmount, and as the 
night was dark, I found it easy to hide away in a 
place where the police wouldn’t find me, and there 
I slept till morning. I got some breakfast, and have 
been trying ever since to find something to do. But 
it’s no use. I’m not a fit object to be in anybody’s 
place of business.” 

And again he cast down a dreary look at his un- 
sightly clothing. 

“ Of course you are not,” said Mr. Granger. “ I’m 
sorry you didn’t speak to me last night. And now, 
if you are in real earnest, Mr. Hartley, we’ll see if 
something can’t be done for you.” 

God knows that I’m in earnest, sir,” he said, 
with a sudden trembling eagerness. “ I lay awake 
so long last night, thinking over my whole life, 
and many times asking God to help me to live 
a better one in future. But I’m down so low 
that it seems as if there was no way for me to get 
up all by myself. I’m like a man in the sea 
who will drown unless somebody throws him a 
rope.” 

“ You shall have the rope.” Granger spoke in 
no uncertain voice. 

It was plain from Hartley’s exhausted and nervous 
state, that he was in no condition to enter at once 
upon any employment. He wanted rest, quiet and 
protection ; with healthy mental surroundings, and 
a sufiicient quantity of nutritious food. We knew 


AS BY FIRE. 273 

of but one place in the city where these could he 
secured ; and there we took him. 

Two weeks in the Franklin Home, and you would 
'not have known the man. Even before the lapse of 
that time he had found employment in the office of 
a conveyancer who had been with him as a boy, and 
who now felt a deep interest in the welfare of his 
old preceptor. 

“ I have had one of the sweetest passages of my 
life,” said Granger, whom I met a few weeks after- 
wards. “I was in Chester day before yesterday, 
where I went to make an address at one of the meet- 
ings now being held in that town. In the audience, 
and sitting close to the platform, I noticed an old 
lady, and a young girl about sixteen years of age, 
both plainly dressed, but with something in their 
faces that caused my eyes to turn towards them fre- 
quently. There was a look of subdued and patient 
trouble in the face of the elder ; and a grave quiet 
in that of the younger. While I spoke their eyes 
did not seem to be off of me for a moment. During 
my address I mentioned Hartley’s case, referring to 
him with some particularity. As I progressed, I 
noticed that the old lady began to lean forward with 
an air of deep interest, if not eager expectancy ; and 
I fancied that the girl by her side was turning pale. 
All at once it flashed on me that these might be the 
mother and daughter of the man whose rescue I was 
describing, and the impression was so strong that I 
held back the name of Hartley as it was coming to 


274 


SAVED 


my lips, and closed my relation of tlie case with the 
words : ‘ Another soul saved through the power of 
that Divine strength which is freely given to all who 
will receive it.’ 

“At the close of the meeting I saw that the two 
women were lingering in their seats while the audi- 
ence slowly retired; and that their eyes were turned 
towards the platform where I remained talking with 
some members of the committee which had the 
meetings in charge. They were almost alone when 
I came down and commenced moving along the aisle. 
‘ May I speak a word with you ?’ said the elder of 
the two ladies, laying her hand at the same time on 
my arm. I saw a quiver in her face. ‘ What is the 
name ?’ I asked. ‘ Mrs. Hartley,’ she replied, softly, 
and as if half afraid to utter her own name. Then 
I knew it all, and my heart gave a sudden bound of 
gladness. Dear old mother. I felt like putting 
my arm about her and crying out : ‘ This thy son 
that was dead is alive again !’ But I kept a guard 
on my lips, not knowing how the good news, if bro- 
ken too suddenly, might affect her ; and taking her 
hand, said : ‘ I am glad to meet you, Mrs. Hartley.’ 
‘ I would like to ask you a question, sir,’ she said, 
beginning now to show considerable agitation. ‘First,’ 
I replied, ‘ let me ask you one. Have you a son 
named Lloyd Hartley ?’ 

“ Her startled face became white as ashes ; and 
she caught hold of me with a tight grasp of the 
hand. ‘Thank God for his deliverance,’ I said, softly. 


AS BY FIBE. 


275 


Her slender form sunk down upon the seat by which 
she was standing, and her head drooped over her 
breast. She was very still, and I knew that her 
heart was lifting itself in thankfulness to God. ‘ In 
the strength of Him who conquered death and hell, 
your son shall stand now as a rock,’ said I, bending 
to her ear. ‘ He is trusting no more in his own 
weakness, but in the power of the Infinite and the 
Almighty. I know what that dependence means ; 
and because of this knowledge I have hope for your 
son.’ ‘ Blessed be the name of the Lord !’ came in 
a low, tender out-breathing of gladness from her 
lips. Her head was still bowed and her face hidden. 
Then, as she reached up one of her hands, she whis- 
pered : ‘ Darling, where are you ?’ and in a moment 
after her arm was about the neck of her grand- 
daughter; and the two clung together, weeping 
silently. And all was so quiet and unobtrusive, that 
the people passed out scarcely noticing anything un- 
usual until we were left almost alone. 

“‘I have been praying for him night and day 
ever since the temperance revival began,’ said the 
happy mother, as I sat with her that evening in her 
home, replying to her questions, and giving her all 
the assurances in my power. ‘And God has an- 
swered my prayers. And when He saves, it is no 
half work, but a true salvation. I have no hope in 
anything else. My son has taken pledge after 
pledge; has made and tried to keep good resolu- 
tions over and over again; but only to fall, and 


276 


SAVED 


eacli time to a lower and a lower depth. If he had 
put his trust in God, if he had prayed for grace and 
strength, and entered, as you tell me he is now 
doing, upon a Christian life, it would have been 
far different. It is the Christian life that saves ; 
and it saves from drunkenness as well as from 
every other sin ; for all sin must be removed be- 
fore there can be a dwelling-place for Christ in the 
soul.’ 

“ I have felt happier and stronger ever since,” 
Granger continued. “ It was really touching to see 
this mother’s confidence. She had been praying 
and weeping before God night and day for weeks — 
pleading for this son that he might be turned from 
the evil of his ways. She did not even know where 
he was ; but she knew that her Lord and Master 
knew. And now, when, as she believed, her 
prayers had been answered in his conversion, she 
rejoiced and was confident. The Everlasting Arms 
were about him, and he would dwell secure.” 

“ Happy faith !” I made answer. “ May its 
foundations never be removed.” 

“I think they never will,” Granger said. “If 
her prayers did not avail just in the order of her 
belief, they still availed, and her son has been 
brought within the fold ; and there is, in the spirit 
he manifests, something that gives me confidence in 
his stability.” 

“ Have you told Hartley about this meeting with 
his mother and daughter ?” I asked. 


AS BY FIRE. 277 

“ Oh, yes. And they have been up to the city to 
see him.” 

“A happy re-union.” 

“ You would have said so if you had seen them 
together. Dear old lady I The love, and tender- 
ness, and joy-subdued that were in her face as she 
sat and looked at her son, to whom much of the old 
true manliness of expression and bearing has al- 
ready commenced coming back, was beautiful and 
touching to witness. It will not be a long time, I 
think, before there will be one home for them all, 
and that a happy one.” 

And it was not long. 



CHAPTER XIX. 


WONDERFUL REFORMATIONS. 

S TRIKING cases of reformation, like the one 
related, yet varying as to the incidents, were of 
daily occurrence. Men who had been for years 
regarded as hopeless drunkards, made a new effort 
to struggle out of the swift waters that were bearing 
them to ruin, and caught eagerly at the new means 
of rescue that were offered. Families long sepa- 
rated were united again ; and men who had been 
dead weights and burdens upon society, became 
once more good and useful citizens. 

“A glorious work !” was heard on all sides. But 
the men who were in the midst of it — who came 
into direct contact with the scores and hundreds of 
wretched creatures who had sounded the lowest 
depths of misery and degradation, who were home- 
less, friendless, penniless, and mentally, morally and 
physically so enervated as to be scarcely capable of 
an effort in the direction of self-recovery, found 
themselves confronted with a task of almost appall- 
ing magnitude. What was to be done with and for 
these men, whose idle hands were held out in 
piteous appeal for work, and whose hungry faces 
and dirty and tattered garments pleaded mutely for 
relief? Nightly the great meeting hall was 
278 


AS BY FIRE. 


279 

crowded to overflowing, and nightly the increase 
went on. 

“ It is one thing,” I said to Mr. Granger, as I 
walked home with him from one of these meetings, 
“ to reap this great harvest, but quite another thing 
to garner and preserve the grain. I sadly fear that 
much of it will never be gathered out of the field. 
The work is too much en masse, and too little in 
detail. The numbers who sign the pledge every 
night cannot be regarded as a measure of the good 
that is being done.” 

“You must bear in mind,” he replied, “that all 
who sign at these meetings are not the utterly desti- 
tute and homeless ; nor of those who have lost the 
power to control their apiDetites. The larger pro- 
portion are men engaged in work or business, to 
whom so strong a conviction of danger has come 
that they take the pledge for protection and safety. 
Most of these will find elements of strength and 
encouragement in their homes and among friends.” 

“True; but if -it be as was said to-night, that 
there are from four to five hundred of the destitute 
and friendless class who have signed the pledge, 
and who must have something- more to rest upon 
than the singing, and talking, and exhortations to 
stand fast, which they get at these nightly meet- 
ings, is it not plain that the loss between the reap- 
ing and the garnering is going to be very great ?” 

“You cannot feel the burden of that thought 
more heavily than we who are in the heart of this 


280 


SAVED 


work. But its growth has been more rapid than 
we had anticipated, and its proportions have already 
assumed a magnitude for which we were not pre- 
pared. The people are looking on and wondering. 
Crowds flock nightly to witness the progress of the 
movement ; but how few come up to our help. 
What would it be for a score of our rich citizens to 
establish for our use a depot of clothing from which 
we might draw at will, and so be able to take off 
the rags of such men as we found to be in earnest 
about reform, and send them forth in sightly gar- 
ments, that they might be in a condition to apply 
for and get employment ? Or what for the churches 
in our city — over four hundred in number — to do 
the same thing ?” 

“ Is nothing really being done to help and save 
these poor creatures ? When the last hymn is 
sung, and the benediction said, and the lights put 
out, does all care for them cease ? Is there nothing 
more until to-morrow night — and then only this 
general work,* which merely brings the individual to 
the front for a little season, and then lets him drift 
out of sight, his special needs unrecognized and un- 
provided for ?” 

“ If you will come to my office at three o’clock 
to-morrow, I will try to give an answer to your ques- 
tion,” Granger replied. “ I must now take the next 
car that passes and get home as quickly as I can, as 
it is growing late.” 

I called at his office at the hour mentioned. 


A8 BY FIRE: 


281 


“ There is other Christian temperance work going 
on in our city besides that remarkable exhibition of 
it which is known as the Murphy movement,” he 
said. “ Work about which the public knows little, 
but which, in its influence on that particular class 
about which we were speaking yesterday, is accom- 
plishing a vast amount of good. I am going to 
answer your question of last evening by showing 
you a phase of this work — unobtrusive, yet very 
effective — and when you see it, you will know that, 
while the hands of the reapers are strong and the 
harvest great, they who gather and garner are not 
idle.” 

I walked with Granger for a number of blocks, 
talking by the way. As we left his office he re- 
marked : “ You might have known that in a work 
like this the hands of the women would not he idle ; 
nor the spirit that moved the late ‘Crusaders’ dead. 
There has only been a change of front, with a more 
guarded movement upon the enemy, and less expen- 
diture of war material. You do not find them 
so much in the noisy front of battle, as where the 
wounded are left on the field or gathered in tent and 
hospital.” 

“ Do you mean,” I asked, “ that there is another 
movement, parallel to this one which is attracting so 
much attention, now going on in our city ?” 

“ Yes ; wholly independent, yet in complete har- 
mony therewith. Two sets of reapers are in the 
same field ; but with one there are better facilities 
18 


282 


SAVED 


for gleaning and garnering than with the other. 
Women draw more closely to the individual than 
men ; have more pity, and sympathy, and faith in 
humanity ; more practical trust in God, and a more 
absolute belief in the power and efficacy of prayer. 
There is a marked contrast between their meetings 
and the vast assemblages you have attended. The 
sphere is quieter, and the services held closer to the 
order of religious worship. There are fewer spec- 
tators, and, I think, a more complete singleness of 
purpose with those who are giving themselves to the 
work. What we, as men, are doing, is extra to our 
common life-work. The largest part of our time 
and thought is devoted to business or professional 
duties ; and we can give only our odds and ends of 
leisure to extra public service and the duties of chari- 
ty. It is different with many of the women who 
are taking the lead in this Gospel temperance work. 
Heart and mind are absorbed in it. It is almost as 
much their daily thought and care as business is to 
the merchant, or the interests of his clients to the 
lawyer. We can, by single strong efforts, move the 
masses in this or that direction ; can influence and 
direct public sentiment, and even set great tidal 
waves of reform in motion ; but for the gathering of 
results, we have little time, and, it may be, little in- 
clination ; and results are too often left to take care 
of themselves.” 

We talked until we came in front of a small 
church in a thickly populated part of the town, when 


AS BT FIRE. 


283 


Granger paused with the words, “ In here,” and we 
passed through a small vestibule to a room capable 
of holding from two to three hundred persons. 
Nearly every seat was occupied. We were conducted 
to chairs set in the space fronting the reading-desk, 
and on being seated I had an opportunity to look at 
the audience, which was composed of men and wo- 
men ; the men largely outnumbering the women. It 
took hut a glance to tell who and from whence most 
of these men were. Lives of sin and suffering ; of 
degradation and crime ; of abused and wasted man- 
hood had left their disfiguring tokens on nearly 
every countenance before me. Half a dozen women 
occupied the small platform, on which the reading- 
desk stood. They were singing — 

“ Jesus, lover of my soul, 

Let me to Thy bosom fly,” 

as we entered, most of the congregation taking part. 
My eyes ran over the strange assembly, looking 
from face to face, and trying to read each varied 
expression. With scarcely an exception, you saw a 
deej), and, in some cases, a most pathetic earnestness. 
At the close of the hymn, one of the women arose, 
and said, in an easy, familiar way, but with a tender, 
peyietrating solemnity in her voice : “And with such 
a refuge, how safe ! Jesus, lover of my soul. The 
love of Jesus! Of the all- compassionate and the 
all-powerful. Think of it I Come to this Saviour, 
His arms are open to receive you. Comfort, support. 


284 


SAVED 


defense; all these shall be yours. Under the shadow 
of His wing you shall dwell in safety.” 

There was a deep hush in the assembly ; a bend- 
ing forward to hearken, and a profound solemnity 
on most of the faces. You saw eyes grow wet, and 
lips move in silent prayer. 

“And now,” said the gentle speaker, after a pause, 
“ we want to hear from as many of you as can bear 
testimony to the saving power of Him who has taken 
your feet out of the miry clay and set them upon a 
rock. Speak with brevity that we may have a 
multitude of witnesses.” 

She sat down and a man, whose face had been 
holding my eyes for some moments, arose from his 
seat. What could one with such a countenance have 
to say about the saving power of Christ, I thought. 
His voice trembled a little as he began : 

“ He has taken my feet out of the pit and set 
them on solid ground ; blessed be His name. I’ve 
been a dreadful hard drinker. Until six weeks ago, 
I don’t think I had drawn a sober breath for ten 
years. My wife left me in despair more than three 
years ago; and then I didn’t care for anything. 
When I heard about the Murphy meetings and what 
wonderful things were being done, I thought I’d go 
and see what it meant. Somehow, with the singing, 
and the way Mr. Murphy talked, I got all broken 
up, and when he told us that if we’d take the pledge 
and trust in God t® help us keep it, we could stand 
jusfas well as he had stood, I said. I’ll try. And I 


AS BY FIRE. 


285 


did try, and, blessed be God ! I’ve been able to keep 
my pledge, I don’t know how it might have been 
if I hadn’t come to these meetings. I’ve found work, 
and I’m trying to make another home. It isn’t 
much of a home as yet — only a single room — but 
my wife is so happy. And we’ve got something in 
that home we never had before. Shall I tell you 
what it is ?” 

He paused for a moment, then in a lower voice 
said : “ Our Saviour.” 

As he sat down, the leader of the music touched 
the organ keys, and a single verse from a well- 
known hymn was sung : 

Saviour, like a shepherd lead us, 

Much we need Thy tender care ; 

In I’hy pleasant pastures feed us, 

F or our use Thy folds prepare ; 

Blessed Jesus ! 

Thou hast bought us. Thine we are.” 

As the singing ceased, I heard the voice of a 
woman in the audience, and turned in the direction 
from which it came. I saw a worn and sallow face, 
and a slender form, plainly but cleanly attired. 

“ I want to tell you,” said the speaker, “ that I’ve 
got my husband again, after having lost him because 
of drink for years and years. And this time I’m 
going to keep him, for God has converted his soul. 
Oh, bless the Lord ! Bless the Lord !” her voice 
rising into almost a passionate outburst. 

“ Yes, bless the Lord, my sist5r,” responded the 
lady who had direction of the meeting. “For 


286 


SAVED 


when He finds the lost ones, He can keep their 
feet from wandering any more.” 

Another hymn, and then another short speech. 
And so for an hour the speaking and the singing 
went on, the interest not flagging for a moment. 
Men told of the awful slavery from which they had 
escaped through the power of God, and of the new 
strength which had come to them in answer to 
prayer, with a positiveness that had in it an ele- 
ment of conviction for the intently listening hearers. 
Some had been standing safe in the midst of tempta- 
tion for only a few days, some for weeks, and some 
for months. Many had already united themselves 
with one or another religious society, and were 
receiving that protection and strength which comes 
from Christian fellowship. 

“A good Christian brother has been holding on 
to me ever since I took the pledge,” said one. 
“May God reward him! If he hadn’t held so 
tightly, I don’t khow what might have happened ; 
I was so miserable and helpless. But I’m getting 
stronger and stronger, and now I’m trying to help 
the weak ones.” 

Said another : “ Thank God for these good Chris- 
tian women. One of them found me not long ago 
in the hands of a policeman, I’d been drinking in 
a saloon, and got into a quarrel with the bar- 
keeper, who called an officer. Just as I was dragged 
out upon the pavement, a woman came by, and she 
stopped and said to the policeman: ‘What’s the 


AS BY FIRE. 


287 


matter? Wliat’s this man been doing?’ She 
spoke so gently, and yet with something so like 
authority in her voice, that he let go of my collar. 
‘Drunk and quarrelsome,’ he answered, gruffly. 
‘Oh, I see,’ she returned. ‘They’ve made him 
crazy with drink, and then turned him over to 
you.’ ‘ Something of that sort,’ said the policeman, 
speaking more respectfully. Then she said, ‘ Sup- 
pose you let me have this case. I shouldn’t won- 
der if I could do a great deal better with it than 
you can.’ The offlcer stood for a little while look- 
ing puzzled ; and I was puzzled, too, for the liquor 
was beginning to go out of my head. ‘ What will 
you do with him ?’ he asked. ‘ Try to make a sober 
man out of him.’ At this he laughed, and said, ‘ If 
you can make a sober man out of Jack Brady, all 
right. Go ahead and try. It’ll be the hardest job 
you ever took.’ But she didn’t find it so. I don’t 
know how it was, but the very minute I heard her 
say that, I made up my mind to stop drinking. 
The j)oliceman went on, and she stood and talked 
to me for a good while, and told mfe about these 
meetings, and how easy it would be to lead a better 
life if I would come and try to get help from above. 
I’d never been talked to like that before. It seemed 
so strange to have anybody care for me, and to seem 
so anxious about me. ‘ Please God, I’ll come,’ said 
I. And I did come. It seemed as if I couldn’t wait 
for the hour next day. And when I entered that 
door, there stood the lady, just where she’s standing 


288 


SA VED 


now, by the reading-desk. She was speaking, and 
as her voice fell on my ears like the voice of an old 
friend, my heart began to beat heavy, and I got all 
into a tremble. Would she know me ? I saw her 
eyes go searching about the room as she talked, but 
if she was looking for me she didn’t make me out. 
I went up as close to the desk as I could get, and 
sat there while the singing and talking and praying 
went on. Not for a minute did I take my eyes 
away from her. All at once as she looked at me 
hard I saw her face brighten up, and I knew that 
she had seen me. In a little while she came and 
sat down by my side and took my hand, and said, 
just for my ear alone, ‘ I’m so glad to see you here, 
Mr. Brady.’ You see she hadn’t forgotten my 
name. ‘ I’ve been looking for you ever since the 
meeting opened. You’re going to sign the pledge, 
of course ; and, better still, give your heart to Jesus. 
And then what a happy man you will be.’ And I 
did sign the pledge, and I did give my heart to Jesus. 
And I’m one of the happiest men in this room to- 
day.” 

As the meeting drew to a close, requests for prayer 
were sent up in writing, or asked for verbally. A 
mother asked for prayers for an intemperate son ; a 
wife for an intemperate husband ; a sister for two 
brothers who were in great danger of becoming 
drunkards ; a reformed man that he might find his 
wife and children, from whom he had not heard for 
two years ; the wife of a tavern-keeper, that her 


AS BY FIRE. 


289 


husband might he convicted of sin, and led to 
abandon his dreadful business ; for a sick wife with 
a drunken husband ; for a daughter whose father 
was intemperate. 

While these requests were being made, a young 
woman — she did not look over twenty-six or seven 
years of age — arose and said : “ My heart is so full, 
Christian friends, that I can’t keep -silent. I want 
to tell what great things prayer can do. I’ve got a 
husband and two little children. My husband took 
to drinking, and it ’most killed me. He was so good 
and kind before ; but now he got cross and ugly, 
and wouldn’t bear a word from me. It was getting 
worse and worse. He’d stay out late at night and 
come home so much in liquor that he didn’t know 
anything. One day I said to his mother, ‘ If Tom 
keeps on in this way, I shall have to leave him and 
go home to father.’ And then she cried, and said, 
‘ Don’t do that, Mary. He’ll go all to ruin if you 
do.’ And we both sat and cried for ever so long. 
While we were crying, a neighbor came in ; and she 
said, ‘ Why don’t you go round to the women’s tem- 
perance meeting and ask them to pray for him ?’ I 
didn’t see what good that was going to do ; but she 
talked so much about it that I said to myself, ‘ It 
can’t do any harm, that’s sure.’ So I put on my 
things and came round here, and Tom’s mother came 
with me. I wrote on a piece of paper, ‘ Prayers 
wanted for a young husband and father who is being 
ruined by drink,’ and sent it up. And when, sin- 


290 


SAVED 


gling this out from all the rest, Mrs. W said, 

in her prayer, ‘This young husband and father. 
Lord, who is being ruined by drink, oh, hear the 
pitiful cry of his wife, and the cry that we are all 
sending up to Thee now. Let Thy Spirit prevail 
with him. Quicken in him the desire for a better 
life ; turn him from the evil of his ways,’ — it seemed 
as if the Lord had come down into this room, and 
as if I had got right hold of Him. After the meet- 
ing was over we went home, and my husband’s 
mother waited until he came in to sujrper. He didn’t 
have much to say ; looked kind of troubled about 
something, I thought. He usually went out directly 
after supper ; but this time he sat for, maybe, half an 
hour, reading a newspaper. Then he took up his 
hat and went away. ‘ Don’t stay out late, Tom, 
please,’ said I, as pleasantly as I could speak. But 
he didn’t answer me a word. His mother had gone 
home by this time, and I was alone with my two 
little children, and they were both asleep. I had a 
strange feeling, as if something was going to happen. 
It might be bad or it might be good — I couldn’t tell. 
My heart was trembling and starting. I couldn’t 
sew ; I couldn’t do anything, but kept going about, 
up and down-stairs, so restless and troubled that I 
didn’t know what to do with myself At last I got 
down on my knees and began to pray for my hus- 
band. And then it seemed as if the blessed Lord 
and Saviour had come into my little room ; and I 
talked to Him as a friend, and pleaded for my hus- 


AS BY FIRE. 


291 


band, and begged Him to save him from the dread- 
ful appetite that was ruining him soul and body. I 
felt better after that. But I couldn’t settle down to 
doing anything. Then I got the Bible and read 
two or three chapters. Tired at last, I laid my face 
down upon the open book and fell asleep. I had a 
sweet dream, but a sweeter waking up, for my hus- 
band’s arms were around me, and I heard his voice 
saying, ‘ Mary, dear !’ in the old, loving way. ‘ Oh, 
what is it, Tom ?’ I cried out, as I started up. And 
then he kissed me, and said, ‘ It’s going to be all 
right again, Mary. I’ve been down to the Murphy 
meeting, and signed the pledge, and, God helping 
me, I’m going to keep it.’ And he has kept it so 
far ; and what’s better, he’s given his heart to Christ, 
and we’ve both joined the church. Oh, I’m so 
happy !” 

My eyes were full of tears when this happy young 
wife sat down. 

Then the lady to whom she had referred, made a 
few impressive comments on the incident just related, 
adding two or three others as strikingly illustrative 
of the value of prayer. One of these was quite re- 
markable, and I was not able to trace, except remotely, 
the relation between cause and effect. She said: 
“At one of the Central Coffee-Room Thursday 
evening meetings at which I was present, a gentle- 
man arose and said, ‘ I want to ask your prayers for 
the drunken son of a poor old mother. I don’t 
know who he is — not even his name, nor where he 


292 


SAVED 


lives. To-niglit, as I was coming here, I saw an old 
woman standing on a corner, and she seemed to be 
in trouble. I stopped and asked what was the mat- 
ter, and she said, “ Oh, dear sir, I’m in great distress. 
I’m old and poor, and have nothing to depend on 
but one son, and he’s taken to bad habits, and spends 
nearly everything he earns in drink ; and if I say a 
word to him, he goes on dreadfully. He hasn’t 
been home all day ; and there’s nothing in the house 
to eat, and I’ve been going all about trying to find 
him.” Aiid the poor old mother wrung her hands 
and moaned so piteously that it made my heart ache. 
I could do nothing for her but give her a little 
money and tell her to go home and pray for her son. 
And now I ask the prayers of all here to-night for 
the son of this aged mother.’ The case was very 
blind. We did not know even the man’s name, nor 
the name of his mother ; how then were we to pre- 
sent him to God? But it was not for us to put 
limits to the Divine power of saving. So we laid 
this unknown mother’s sorrow, and this unknown 
man’s sin and desolation before the Lord and left 
the case with Him. Well, on the next Ttursday 
evening the gentleman arose again, and said, ‘I have 
good news from the man whom I asked you to pray 
for at our last meeting. He has been saved.’ What 
a thrill of joy went through me ! ‘ On the very 

evening afterwards I met his old mother again. It 
seemed almost as if she had dropped down in the 
street before me ; and she told me this glad story : 


AS BY FIRE. 


293 


“ After I saw you,” she said, “ I went home and 
waited for my son, crying and praying, and in great 
distress of mind. It was about half-past ten o’clock 
when I heard him come in — he never got home 
much before twelve — and it gave me a start. Up- 
stairs he came; not stumbling nor unsteady, but 
every step distinct and firm. When he opened the 
door, I saw something strange in his face. I didn’t 
know what it meant. Such a light in his eyes, and 
such a soft, gentle look about his mouth. ‘O 
John !’ I cried out, almost catching my breath. Then 
he said, ‘ Mother, I’ve been to one of them great 
meetings, and I’ve signed the pledge, and if God 
will only give me the strength to keep it. I’ll live 
and die a sober man.’ Oh, dear, how my poor old 
heart did leap for joy. Then I got him round the 
neck, and I said, ‘ Let us kneel right down here, 
John, and pray that God will give you all the 
strength you want.’ And down we knelt ; and such 
a prayer-meeting as we had together ; it lasted till 
almost morning.” ’ 

“ With such instances of the power of prayer for 
our encouragement,” continued the speaker, “ and I 
could give many more that have come under my 
own observation quite as remarkable, let us not 
hesitate in our petitions, but come confidently to 
God. Among the written requests for prayer which 
I now hold in my hand, is one that has moved me 
deeply. Three young wives ask your prayers for 
their intemperate husbands. Three young wives.” 


294 


SAVED 


Her voice falling on the words in low, pitying 
cadences. “Think of it! Three young wives; 
happy brides a little while ago, and with the sweet 
grace and charm of girlhood still about them ! 
What an outlook upon life for these dear young, 
souls. They have met together, and each has told 
to the others her sorrow and her fear. They have 
seen their young husbands drifting, and drifting, 
and drifting away, every effort to hold them back 
in vain. They will be lost if some influence, greater 
than it is their power to exercise, is not brought 
to bear upon them. And now they ask our prayers. 
Let us offer them in loving faith ; and not for these 
only, but for all the special cases which have been 
brought to us this day.” 

I had heard at one of the revival meetings, a 
year or two before, a long list of requests for prayer 
read off very much in the routine way of an entry 
clerk reading off the items of an invoice ; and then 
the prayers were offered up in a kind of wholesale 
fashion that struck me as almost irreverent and 
quite useless. 

But the prayer that I now heard affected me very 
differently. There was in it nothing of routine or 

dead formality. Mrs. W , to whom the duty 

of offering these requests to God had been assigned, 
felt, it was plain, the troubled heart-beat of those 
whom she represented in her petitions. Not a sin- 
gle request, written or verbal, was forgotten. Each, 
in turn, was offered before the Lord, and with such 


BY FIRE. 


295 


feeling and earnestness and individuality of need 
and condition, that I was not only surprised at the 
singular clearness with which she had apprehended 
each case, but deeply moved by the sphere of her 
trusting and reverent piety. 

At the close of this prayer and the singing that 
followed, the pledge was offered to those who had 
not signed, and all who felt the need of spiritual 
counsel and comfort were invited to go into the 
inquiry-room. 



CHAPTEE XX. 

CONQUERING AND TO CONQUER. 

“ ~1 r OW long has this been going on ?” I asked 
J — L of Mr. Granger as we walked away. 

“ For months,” he replied. 

“Are the meetings held daily ?” 

“Yes.” 

“And always crowded like this?” 

“Always.” 

“And as full of interest?” 

“ The interest never flags. You see how entirely 
in earnest these women are, and how completely 
they have thrown themselves into this work, which 
has still another side.” 

“Another side ?” 

“Yes. Their faith in prayer is unbounded. Some 
of them take the Bible promises so literally that they 
verily believe a mountain could be removed and cast 
into the sea if prayer and faith were strong enough. 
‘ Spiritual forces are higher and more subtle than 
natural forces, and spiritual laws above and superior 
to natural laws,’ I once heard one of them say, while 
speaking of the power of prayer, ‘ and can suspend 
or set them aside altogether, as in miracles ; and it 
is because our faith is so weak,- and we ask so often 
amiss, asking selfishly, that marvels are not wrought 
296 


AS BY FIRE. 


297 


by prayer which would astonish the world.’ She 
held that if the Christian people of this city would 
unite in one strong and persistent prayer to God, 
He would set agencies in motion that would close 
every liquor-saloon in our midst and cause wicked- 
ness to cease. But there are those among them 
who keep nearer to the earth, and who have faith in 
other saving means beside that of prayer. Who 
believe in feeding the hungry, and clothing the 
naked, and building up and sustaining the natural 
degree of life, so that the spiritual degree which has 
just been vivified with grace from above may have 
an orderly foundation upon which to rest. The 
other side of this work to which I have referred, 
has relation to the lower degree of life which rests 
on the earth, and which must be in some degree of 
health and order before it is possible for spiritual life 
to have sustenance and growth.” 

“ Women have a very practical side, and are quick 
in their perception of wants and means,” I remarked. 

“ Yes ; and what is more, are quick to act. When 
/ they see that a thing ought to be done, they go about 
doing it; and often while we are thinking and de- 
bating, their will has found the way. You remem- 
ber how it was at the beginning of the war. Soldiers 
from the North who were landed from the ferry- 
boats at the foot of Washington Avenue to await 
farther transportation, were found hungry and ex- 
hausted, sitting on curb-stones and door-stgps, or 
lying asleep on the pavement, no provision having 
19 


298 


SAVED 


been made for feeding them on the way. What 
happened ? While the men stood looking on, and 
blaming the Government for neglect of provision at 
this point, the women had their coffee-pots on the 
fire, and out from the houses all along the line of 
the street came quickly smoking cups and pitchers, 
aijd plates of bread and meat, and baskets of re- 
freshing fruit. You remember how this thing stirred 
your heart at the time, and the hearts of all to whom 
it was told the land over ; and how, from this good 
beginning, the refreshment-saloons were started, 
giving such abundance of good cheer to the hun- 
dreds of thousands of soldiers who afterwards went 
through our city — ^the new recruits pressing forward 
to the battle-fields, and the sick, and war- wasted, and 
wounded returning home to recover their strength or 
die.” 

“ Yes, yes. I remember well. And the thought of it 
after so many years gives my heart a quicker motion.” 

“ Now, as then, the action of the women is direct 
and practical. They do not stand looking on sor- 
rowfully, and with folded hands, waiting for organ- 
ized agencies. There are no strong appeals to the 
public for help, and pauses for response. But in- 
stead, an immediate taking hold of and use of what- 
ever means lie close at hand. Food and clothing 
are gathered and distributed, and cases of destitution 
and homelessness met and ministered to. If not to 
the ful]^xtent of the need, yet always to the extent 
of ability.”' 


AS BY FIRE. 


299 


“ That is well,” said I. “ Prayers are good, but 
they never take the place of potatoes. A hungry 
man is a poor subject for religion ; and a dirty and 
ragged one scarcely any better.” 

“ Yes, we all understand this. And it is just here 
that the great work of reform now going on in our 
city finds one of its chief impediments,” Mr. Gran- 
ger answered. “What these devoted Christian 
women are doing is as the first spontaneous efforts 
which were made by loyal women to feed the hungry 
soldiers who were passing through our city. There 
was a great blessing in it, hut the blessing was lim- 
ited for lack of the larger supplies and more perfect 
organization which came afterwards. So now, much 
is being done with imperfect means; hut, as the 
work goes on, and its results become more widely 
known, as interest deepens and sympathy grows 
broader, I look for that liberal and substantial co- 
operation which is so essential to its success.” 

“ The ardor that now attends this work,” said I, 
“ will it not die out ? There is a waste of energy in 
enthusiasm. Of all excitements, none spend them- 
selves more quickly than religious excitements, be- 
cause they are so intense. The more permanent 
forces are quiet and almost unobtrusive. In a few 
weeks the heat of summer will be upon us, and Mr. 
Murphy will go away. There will be no more 
crowded halls, no more Sunday- morning breakfasts, 
nor stirring appeals and moving invitations. What, 
then, is to become of these weak, and tempted, and 


300 


SAVED 


almost friendless ones who have just been lifted from 
the slough ? It troubles me to think of it. Is the 
entire cessation of these religious temperance meet- 
ings for two or three months a well-considered 
thing ? To retire from the field and leave the enemy 
in full possession after such a series of victories as 
you have had, can hardly be considered good gene- 
ralship.” 

“There is going to be no abandonment of the 
field,” Granger replied. 

“ I understood differently.” 

“ Do you suppose, for a single moment, that the 
women who are in this battle are going to ground 
their arms, or leave the field for any cause ? ‘ How 
often will you hold your meetings?’ I asked of 
Mrs. — ; and she answered quietly, “Three 
hundred and sixty-five days in the year.’ ‘No 
intermission this summer?’ ‘^one,’ she replied. 
‘ How could we leave these hundreds of pre- 
cious souls, just rescued from the slavery of 
drunkenness, some of them without homes, or 
friends, or work, in the very midst of temptation ? 
If any were lost through our neglect, or ease-seek- 
ing, would not the stain of their blood be upon our 
garments? Verily do we believe that God has 
called us to this work of saving men who, because 
of their utter degradation through intemperance, 
have been rejected by society and abandoned by the 
churches. Helpless, hopeless, lost but for the 
agencies now raised up in the Divine Providence 


[AS BY FIRE. 


301 


for tlieir rescue, shall we, to whom has been com- 
mitted the great responsibility of using and direct- 
ing these agencies, fold our hands and seek for rest 
and recreation, while so many feet are only on the 
unsteady margin of the pit out of which they have 
been dragged, and so many hands clinging to our 
garments, lest, if their hold be loosed, they fall 
again ? No, no. There is too much at stake.’ ” 

“ Brave, true women !” I responded, with ardor. 
“ In all works of Christian charity they are ever in 
the advance. But will nothing be done by the men 
whose efforts have been crowned by such wonderful 
results as we have seen? Will they wholly aban- 
don the work until their summer vacation is over ? 
The enemy will surely be diligent in his work of 
sowing tares in their field while they rest.” 

“ Only this great public demonstration will cease,” 
Mr. Granger replied. “But you may be sure of 
one thing, the enemy is not going to have it all his 
own way. Faithful guards, and sentinels, and re- 
serve forces will be left, and he will be held to the 
lines back upon which he has been driven. W^hen 
the fall campaign opens, we shall have a more 
thorough organization, and larger means. So far, 
it has only been as a skirmish along the lines com- 
pared to the battles that must be fought. W^e do 
not make light of our enemy. He is not to be 
vanquished by a single fierce onslaught, nor by a 
single desperate battle. All hell is on his side; 
and among men he draws his myriads of recruits 


302 


SAVED 


from the young and the old who have inordinate 
desires and evil passions, and selfish ends to serve 
and gratify. Prejudice, and interest, and sensual 
desire are on his side. He is intrenched behind 
law, usage, fallacy and appetite. His friends and 
emissaries are to be found everywhere. In the 
halls of legislation, in courts of justice, in executive 
and municipal offices, and, sad to say, often even in 
the pulpit; though, thanks to the growth of a 
higher Christianity, his representatives are fast 
disappearing from the sacred desk.” 

“Ho mean enemy with which to engage in bat- 
tle,” said I. “As to the ultimate victory, that is 
very far off. It will hardly be seen in your day or 
mine. The battle with hell has been raging for 
thousands of years, and, for all we can see, will con- 
tinue for thousands of years longer ; and if all hell 
is on the side of the liquor traffic and intemperance, 
all hell must be conquered before they will cease. 
From this survey of the field the outlook is not, I 
confess, a very hopeful one.” 

“ It is as full of hope as Christianity,” returned 
Mr. Granger. “As that gains in strength and vital 
power, temperance will have an equal gain, for the 
very life of Christianity is to reject evil as sin 
against God. An intemperate man cannot be a 
Christian man in any true sense, because he is 
selfishly indulging a depraved appetite which not 
only hurts his body, but w’eakens and degrades 
his mind, and so unfits him for that service 


A8 BY FIRE. 303 

of God and his neighbor which constitutes re- 
ligion.” 

“ Taking this view, intemperance becomes a sin.” 

“ Is it the service of God or the service of self?” 
Granger asked. “ The holding of appetite subject 
to reason and the laws of health, or the giving of 
lower and destructive things power over the higher 
and conservative? Is intemperance a good or an 
evil ? If evil, then it is sin.” 

“ What of moderate drinking — the temperate use, 
as it is called, of wine and other stimulants ? Is 
there sin in this ?” 

“ Sin is the voluntary doing of anything that we 
know to be hurtful to the neighbor, or contrary to 
the law of God,” Granger replied. 

“ Then I may drink wine or beer moderately, and 
be innocent. There is no law of God which says, 
‘ Thou shalt not drink wine or beer.’ And it can- 
not hurt my neighbor. If any one is hurt, it is 
myself alone.” 

“Can you hurt yourself without hurting your 
neighbor ?” 

“ Not if my neighbor have any claim which this 
hurting of myself prevents me from meeting.” 

“ Has the body no claim on the hand or foot ? 
Can either of them say, I may hurt myself if I 
choose — that is my own affair ? Depend upon it, 
Mr. Lyon, there is no man in human society, no 
matter how weak, or obscure, or lowly he may be, 
who has not a service to perform, in default of 


304 


SAVED 


which some other human being — it may he many 
huinan beings — must sufier. Society is an organic 
form, in which we all have our places and func- 
tions ; and society is sick, and lame, and covered 
with cancerous sores, only because it has so many 
idle, useless, self-hurting and vicious members and 
organs in its great social body. Under this view, 
no one who selfishly indulges in any practice that 
diminishes his power to serve those who have claims 
upon him, can he free from sin.” 

“ I see your broader view and your broader confi- 
dence,” I returned. “ Whatever is gained for Chris- 
tianity is gained for temperance.” 

“Any true gain to Christianity is a gain to tem- 
perance ; for to be a Christian man means to be a 
temperate man,” he said. “There is no such a 
thing as a tippling Christian, though there may be 
a tippling professor ; for in so far as a man tipples, 
moderately or immoderately, he is not a Christian — 
not a free spiritual man, but in bondage to the 
flesh.” 

“There are many who would consider such a 
declaration as uncharitable and unwarranted,” I re- 
marked. 

“ Do you ?” he asked. 

“ My ideal of a Christian man is very high,” I 
returned. 

“You would not have him a slave to any corpo- 
real lust or appetite ?” 

“He could not be; for in so far as one is not 


AS BY FIRE. 


305 


lifted above these, he is not a Christian. Religion 
can scarcely be worth anything if it does not save a 
man from the dominion of his animal nature. It 
must reform and regenerate the external as well as 
the internal. His very feet, the lowest and most 
ultimate things of his life, must be washed and made 
clean.” 

“ I could not express my own views more exact- 
ly,” Granger replied. As we were parting, he said: 
“A few friends are to be at my house this evening. 

I wish you would come round.” 

“ Who are they ?” I inquired. 

“ Dr. Gilbert, from New York, will be there.” 

“ I shall be glad to meet him.” 

“And Judge Arbuckle and his wife, front Colum- 
bus. The judge and I were in the same class at 
college, and warmly attached friends. It is nearly 
twenty years since our last meeting. He is a man 
of fine qualities, both as to head and heart, with de- 
cided opinions and considerable force of character. 
You will enjoy an evening in his company, I am 
sure ; and none the less, I think, from the fact that 
there is likely to be an earnest encounter between 
him and Dr. Gilbert.” 

. “ Indeed ! On what subject ?” 

“ The judge, I am sorry to say, is not a temper- 
ance man. He has always taken stimulants, and 
believes their moderate employment to be useful.” 

“ Has he ever given the subject a careful invest!- * 
gation ?” 


306 


SAVED 


“ I presume not. Law and politics have claimed 
his closer attention.” 

“A discussion between him and Dr. Gilbert, if it 
should happen to arise, is likely to be a warm one.” 

“ It will be earnest, but fair and courteous, for 
both are gentlemen,” said Mr. Granger. “I am 
glad of the opportunity to bring these men together, 
for after their meeting, my old friend Arbuckle will, 
I think, be in possession of facts that must set him 
thinking in a new direction. As for himself, I do 
not greatly fear the serious encroachments of appe- 
tite ; for he is an exceptionally well-balanced man, 
with a cool, clear head, and finely-strung nerves ; 
and is known for his moderation and conservative 
force of character. But his example and influence 
cannot fail to be exceedingly hurtful, especially with 
young men.” 

I promised to make one of his guests that even- 
ing, and we parted. 



CHAPTEE XXI. 


SOWING GOOD SEED. 

M e. GEAXGEE’S law business, which had 
grown rapidly, was already • giving him a 
handsome income, and his family was again living 
in a style of comparative elegance. His daughter 
Amy had developed into a rarely attractive maiden, 
and was greatly beloved and admired in the circles 
where she moved. Her quiet grace and dignity 
were in marked contrast with the free and jaunty 
manners seen in too many of. our young girls, and 
lifted her above them in the estimation of all who 
held the sex in any high regard,. There were those 
who sought to win her favor, but as most of the 
young men whom she happened to meet in society, 
took part in its drinking customs, she kept herself 
on guard against their advances and held them at a 
safe distance. The shadows which intemperance 
had thrown over her early life rested too deeply on 
her spirits to be wholly removed ; and the pain and 
humiliation they had occasioned were things that 
could never be forgotten. To see a glass of wine at 
the lips of a young man was to lift between himself 
and her an impassable barrier. She might esteem 
him as a friend ; but she locked the door of her 
heart against him. If, as happened more than once, 

307 


308 


SAVED 


a warmer sentiment than friendship had commenced 
forming, she smothered it out with a quick and reso- 
lute hand on discovering the fatal impediment. 

But love steals in by unguarded ways, and when 
once within the citadel of the heart, holds to his 
advantage and makes vigorous resistance should an 
attempt be made to cast him out. It so happened 
that a young man named Pickering, found favor 
with Amy, and that almost before she was aware of 
her danger, the citadel of her heart had been taken. 
Handsome in person, pure in life, and true and 
manly in his character, Henry Pickering was en- 
tirely worthy of the love which she was not able to 
keep from revealing itself in her eyes.. 

A few months after their more intimate acquaint- 
ance, and when the young man’s attitude towards 
Amy left but little doubt as to his feelings and in- 
tentions, they met at an evening entertainment, where 
liberal refreshments were served. A sudden chill 
and suspense fell upon the maiden’s heart, as, with 
her hand on Pickering’s arm, she began moving 
towards the supper-room ; for the clink of glasses 
and popping of corks could already be heard. She 
had never until now met this young man at an 
evening party ; nor had anything occurred in their 
intercourse so far that gave her any intimation of 
his attitude towards the too prevalent drinking 
usages of society. In all her intercourse with him, 
she had not seen the smallest indication of any in- 
dulgence in wine or intoxicating drinks, and there 




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“Thank you; no wine for me,” replied A^my—PapeSOl 







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AS BY FIRE. 


311 


liad come to be with her a tacit and fond belief that 
he was one of those who kept himself entirely free 
from their use. 

But now the hour of trial and proof had come, 
and as they entered the supper-room, Amy’s breath- 
ing became constricted, and her heart beat with 
h(,'avy, almost suffocating throbs. She took her 
place a little back from the table, which was liber- 
ally supplied with glasses and bottles of wine, and 
waited for her attendant to bring her some of the 
refreshments that were being served. This was 
speedily done. As Pickering handed her the plate 
which he had filled, he said: “Will you have a 
glass of champagne, or some sherry ?” 

“Thank you; no wine for me,” replied Amy, 
with something in her voice that caused the young 
man to look at her a little curiously. 

“ You would not have me drink alone ?” he said. 

“I would not have you drink at all,” she an- 
swered, a low thrill of feeling in her otherwise 
steady voice. 

Pickering’s eyes rested on hers for a moment or 
two, after which he turned from her slowly, going 
to the table and filling another plate with salad and 
oysters. Then he came back to his place by her 
side ; but, as they stood eating, they were turned a 
little away from each other. The young man, who 
had been a resident of the city for only a year or 
two, knew nothing at this time of Mr. Granger’s 
history. 


312 


SAVED 


It soon became evident to Pickering that his 
companion was only making a pretence of eating. 

“ Let me get you something else,” said he. “This 
isn’t to your taste. What shall it be ?” 

But she replied, as, she handed him her plate: 
“Nothing more, I thank you.” 

He was looking full into her face now, and saw 
with concern that the brows were slightly drawn, 
and the color diminished. 

“Are you not feeling well? The room is very 
warm. Let me bring you an ice ?” 

But she declined anything more, and promptly 
accepted the young man’s invitation to return to the 
parlpr, where they took a seat near one of the win- 
dows through which the fresh, cool air Avas coming. 
The whole manner of the girl, as well as the ex- 
pression of her face, had changed ; and Pickering 
was troubled and at a loss to know the meaning of 
this change which had come so suddenly. 

“ I’m afraid you are ill,” he said. 

“ Oh, no, no,” Amy replied, endeavoring to rally 
herself She was too truthful for any subterfuge. 

“ If not ill, then something has gone wrong. Miss 
Granger ; and I am concerned to know what it is. 
Have I done anything to disturb or offend you ?” 

Amy’s eyes, which had been on his face, dropped 
to the floor, and she made no answer. The young- 
man’s thought turned back hurriedly, and went over 
the brief incidents of the supper-room. Was it 
the offer of ' a glass of wine ? He would know, and 


A8 BY FIRE. 313 

at once put the question: “Do you object to 
wine?” 

“ It is a dangerous thing,” she replied. 

“ If carried to excess ; but not when used in 
moderation.” 

“ If never used in moderation, excess is impossi- 
ble. No man is safe but he who lets it alone.” 

She spoke in a low, steady voice, in which the 
young man noticed the same thrill of feeling that 
was in it when she answered him in the supper- 
room — “ I would not have you drink at all.” 

“ Why, Miss Granger !” Pickering exclaimed, 
trying to make light of the matter, “ I didn’t know 
before that you were a little temperance enthusiast.” 

“ It is not with me a matter of enthusiasm,” she 
replied, speaking soberly, “ but of deep feeling and 
settled principle.” 

“ Oh ! I was not aware of this before. If I had 
known it, I should not have committed the rudeness 
of offering you wine ; and I crave pardon for my 
unfortunate blunder. You are, then, an advocate 
of entire abstinence.” 

“Where the use of a useless thing is attended 
with such awful perils as attend the use of wine, is 
not he the wise man who lets it alone ?” 

“ I will not say no. Miss Granger. But your pro- 
position is very sweeping. I might take issue with 
you on the word ‘useless,’ but am in no way inclined 
to do so just now. Intemperance is, I am well 
aware, the great curse of our land.” 


314 


SAVED 


“And no one who uses intoxicating drinks of any 
kind, whether moderately or not, is safe from this 
curse,” said Amy. 

“ I should be sorry to believe that. Miss Granger. 
I know of a great many men who take their wine or 
beer every day ; but I do not think them in any 
danger.” 

“ Not one of them ?” Her voice was quiet, but 
firm. 

“All men are not strong alike, nor given to 
moderation. • Some are inclined to excess in every- 
thing. There is always danger with such.” 

“And danger with all who use an article which 
invites to excess the very moment you take it. It 
is here, Mr. Pickering, that the great peril lies. 
No man is safe who admits an enemy within his 
fortress ; and alcohol is always an enemy.” 

“ We were speaking of wine, not ardent spirits,” 
said the young man. 

But Miss Granger was better informed than he 
had supposed. 

“ What we call wine is, for the most part, only 
diluted, drugged and flavored alcohol. Without 
the character and quality given by alcohol, few 
would care to drink it. It takes more wine than 
brandy to give the required exhilaration; that is 
all.” 

“ You are booked on this subject. Miss Granger,” 
said Pickering, his brows arching slightly, and his 
voice betraying some annoyance. 


AS BY FIRE. 


315 


“ Where such grave results attend the use of an 
article, is it not well to examine carefully the ground 
of its claim upon our confidence ?” 

There was no excitement in Amy’s manner ; yet 
it did not escape the young man’s observation that, 
hidden beneath her quiet exterior, was a great deal 
of repressed feeling. 

“ But the novel thing to me is, the fact that a 
young lady like yourself should he posted on the 
subject of making and flavoring' wines,” returned 
Pickering, rising into an air of banter.. “According 
to your view of the case, wine-drinking is only 
another name for whisky-drinking.” 

“ If,” replied Amy, not moved from her serious 
attitude, “ the drink we call wine is acceptable as a 
beverage because of the temporary exhilaration its 
alcohol produces, may it not be true that wine- 
drinking is, as you say, another name for whisky- 
drinking ?” 

“ But is it, as you allege. Miss Granger, that alco- 
hol gives to wine its chief acceptable quality ? I 
have never studied the subject; but it seems to me 
that you must be in some degree of error.” 

“ I have been in the way of hearing a great deal 
about these matters, and from those who have con- 
ducted their investigations with great care,” said 
Amy, “ and I am just as certain, as I am of any 
other declared result of chemical test and analysis, 
that wine contains so large a proportion of alcohol 
as to make its use exceedingly dangerous.” 

20 


316 


SAVED 


“ "VVliat proportion?” asked Pickering. His man- 
ner had become more serious. 

“ I have heard it variously stated,” was replied ; 
“the percentage running from seven or eight to 
twenty-five or six.” 

“ So large ? I wonder how much alcohol whisky 
or brandy contains? You are, no doubt, informed 
as to that also.” 

“ From forty to sixty per cent., I am told.” 

“ Then, if I drink two or three glasses of wine, I 
get about as much alcohol as if I took a single glass 
of whisky or brandy ?” 

“ The danger is that such will be the case.” 

The young man sat with a thoughtful air for a 
few moments, and then looking up, said, with a 
forced levity of manner : “ This is almost comical, 
Miss Granger.” 

“ What ?” inquired his companion, her clear eyes 
fixed steadily on him. 

“Free-and-easy drinking in the dining-room, 
and a temperance lecture in the parlor,” he replied, 
with a smile breaking into his handsome counte- 
nance. 

Ere Amy could reply, the sound of laughing 
voices was heard at the parlor doors, and half a 
dozen girls and young men came in from the hall 
and dining-room in gayer spirits than when they 
went to the refreshment-tables half an hour before. 
As one and another returned to the parlor, it was 
noticeable that a change had come over their spirits. 


AS BY FIRE. 


317 


Many of tlie young girls laughed and talked in 
louder tones, and were freer, in their manners than 
before ; sometimes to a degree that was unmaidenly ; 
while the conduct of some of the young men was 
offensive to good taste for its rudeness or folly. 

“ When the wine is in the wit is out,” said Pick- 
ering, as, rising, he offered his arm to Amy, and 
they moved down the parlor and mingled with the 
company, adding, as they gained the lower end of 
the room, “We might call this the application to 
your little sermon.” 

“And the oftener the wine goes in will the wit go 
out,” returned his companion, speaking for his ear 
alone, “ until in the end it may come to stay out 
altogether.” 

“ I see how it is. Miss Granger,” said the young 
man. “ Your thought has a habit of running to the 
last result of things.” 

“ Is not that wisest ?” she asked. ' 

“ Doubtless. But the surprise with me is, that a 
young lady should have such radical views on the 
subject of drinking. You are in no danger. Nor 
are these young ladies, for all the wine they get 
at parties. A little lightness in the head as 
you see now, then a night’s sleep, and all will be 
over.” 

“ But what of the young men, their companions?” 
asked Amy. 

Pickering gave a slight shrug. 

“Will it be all over, as you say, with them? 


318 


SAVED 


Will tlie appetite be no stronger, and tbe power to 
resist its enticements no weaker ?” 

“I was speaking of the young ladies, and the 
danger to them,” said Pickering. 

“Is no one hurt by intemperance but the men 
who are its victims ?” inquired the girl. “ If I am 
not at fault in my observation, there are to be found 
among them sons, brothers, husbands and fathers. 
Have women no relation to these men ? In their 
wounding is there no hurt to the sisters and daugh- 
ters, to the wives and the mothers ?” 

Pickering felt again the old thrill in Amy’s calm 
but earnest voice. 

“ If a young or middle-aged man should go home 
from here to-night the worse for the wine he has 
taken,” she added, after a slight pause, “ will there 
be no shame or sorrow in any yeoman’s heart 
because of it ?” 

His ear caught the sound of a faint sigh which 
followed the closing words that fell from his com- 
panion’s lips. 

“We won’t talk about this any more,” he said. 
“ The theme is too sombre for so gay and festive an 
occasion.” He spoke with some decision of manner. 
“And now,” he added, in a lighter voice, “let us try 
a little nonsense, by way of a restorative.” 

Amy had already said far more than it was in 
her thought or purpose to say at the outset, and was 
very willing to let the subject drop, even though far 
from being satisfied with the young man’s utterances 


AS BY FIRE. 


319 


on tlie question, which, if his views were not in 
accord with hers, must stand as an impassable barrier 
between them. One thing she had long ago settled 
in her mind, and that was, never to give her hand 
in marriage to one who did not wholly abstain from 
the use of alcohol in any of its forms. She would 
take no risks here. The danger, in her view, was 
too appalling. Her answer to the question : “ How 
shall I be saved from the curse of strong drink ?” 
was simple and direct. She would neither touch it 
herself in any of its covert or enticing forms, nor 
place her happiness in the keeping of one w'ho did. 

At the next meeting of the lovers, for so we must 
call them, though the young man had not yet made 
a formal declaration of his sentiments, each felt that 
a barrier had risen between them. In the mean- 
time, Pickering had, in response to some inquiries 
about Miss Granger’s family, learned something of 
its painful history, and of the sufferings and humil- 
iation through which the girl had passed. This 
made clear the ground of her prejudice against wine- 
drinking. I say “prejudice,” using the word as 
Pickering used it at the time. One thing was plain 
to him ; he saw that there would be little hope of 
compromise with Amy in regard to the use of 
intoxicating liquor in any of its forms. If he were 
not prepared to stand on her ground, so far as this 
question was concerned, he could hardly hope to 
stand with her at all. 

It was this conviction in the mind of Pickering, 


320 


SAVED 


and the doubts and uncertainties as to his real atti- 
tude in regard to the use of alcoholic drinks which 
troubled Miss Granger, that raised the barrier too 
plainly visible to each on their next meeting. Both 
studiously avoided any reference to the subject, 
though it was never absent a moment from the 
thought of either. For the first time since their 
more intimate acquaintance, Amy made an effort to 
hold herself away, and even to close her heart against 
him. Her reserve was so apparent that it hurt, 
then piqued, and then partially offended the young 
man. 

“If love,” he said to himself, “has no deeper 
foundation than this, is it worth the name ? Is the 
taking or refusing of a glass of wine to be the test 
of its quality ? The love that I want is a love that 
can take me for what I am, and trust me all in all ; 
and if she cannot do this, it might as well be at an 
end between us. To subject myself to any humiliating 
pledges and restrictions, is simply impossible. I 
hold my manly freedom too high for that.” 

An evening of embarrassed intercourse, followed 
by a cold parting, was the result. They did not 
meet again for over a week, during which time Amy 
had striven hard, but vainly, to keep the thought of 
Pickering out of her mind. With him the effort to 
banish her image had been no more successful ; and 
as day after day went by without seeing her, tender- 
ness grew in his heart, and the conviction became 
stronger and stronger that for him life would be 


AS BY FIRE. 


321 


nothing if not shared with her. Taking all things 
into consideration, he was beginning to feel more 
sympathy with the girl in her extreme views. “ It 
is hut natural,” he said, “ for a burnt child to dread 
the fire. All that she has seen and suffered must 
be set down in her favor.” 

A week of enforced absence was all that Picker- 
ing could endure ; and when he met the sweet young 
girl again the ardor of his feelings was too strong for 
repression. Love looked out from his eyes more 
tenderly than ever, and betrayed itself more nearly 
on his tongue. As for Amy, the gladness of heart 
which she could not repress overflowed and revealed 
itself in her blushing face. Before they parted on 
that evening, the lover had spoken, and the maiden, 
while not consenting in words, had left him in no 
doubt as to the real state of her feelings. 

Not the remotest reference was made to the subject 
which had, only a little while before, come in be- 
tween them with its warning shadow and its sepa- 
rating wall. Was it forgotten by either of them ? 
Not so. But their hearts held it away from any 
present influence. Love’s fruition was for the mo- 
ment too full for the intrusion of any remote ques- 
tions of prudence. For love’s sake all light impedi- 
ments must disappear when the time came for their 
consideration. 

So they felt; but with each the feeling of confidence 
had its ground in the fancied concession of the other. 
If Henry Pickering really loved her, would he 


322 


SAVED 


hesitate in a matter which she held to be of such 
vital moment ? So the maiden thought, and took 
the sweet assurance to her heart. “ Amy loves me 
too well to let a mere prejudice or fancy stand be- 
tween us,” said the young man, confidently, to him- 
self. 

But they erred in their conclusions. When the 
young man pressed a closer suit, Amy referred him 
to her father, and Pickering found that there would 
be no consent with either unless the question of his 
attitude to the drinking customs of society was 
clearly settled. 

“Neither myself nor my daughter,” said Mr. 
Granger, “ can afibrd to run so great a risk as is 
here involved. For myself, I would rather see my 
child with the angels.” He betrayed considerable 
emotion. 

“ I must infer from all this,” said Pickering, un- 
able entirely to conceal his disappointment and 
irritation, “ that you think me in special danger.” 

“ No ; only in the danger that comes to all who 
walk in dangerous ways,” was the seriously-spoken 
reply. “ If we know that robbers lie in wait along a 
certain road, what immunity from attack have we 
if we travel that roadj”’ 

“ Shall we he cowards, then ? or, like brave men, 
fight our way through ?” 

“ If we have no business that requires us to go by 
that road, we put our courage to a useless test,” re- 
plied Mr. Granger. “This way of drinking, my 


AS BY FIRE. 


323 


young friend, is not an orderly appointed way in 
life. It leads to no desirable result ; has no goal of 
fortune, or honor, or happiness. They who walk in 
it are not exposed to the assaults of robbers alone, 
who waste and plunder their substance, but fatal 
miasmas lie along the marshes through which it 
often winds. It has pitfalls in many of its smoothest 
places, and steep precipices to which the road clings 
treacherously. If a man propose to go in this way, 
it is better that he should go alone, Mr. Pickering. 
Love, surely, will not expose its object, needlessly, 
to dangers like these.” 

“ Frankly, Mr. Granger, I see more of hyperbole 
in all this than a statement of what the real danger 
is,” said Pickering. 

The irritation that betrayed itself in his manner 
a little while before was all gone ; and though his 
speech was plain, it was not in the least disre- 
spectful. 

“The direful effects that too surely attend on 
excessive drinking, can scarcely be exaggerated by 
any figures of speech that our language is capable of 
forming,” answered Mr. Granger. “I am many 
years older than you, and have seen deeper into 
this evil of intemperance than it is possible for you 
to have seen ; and such is my dread of its subtle 
power that I never see a man with a glass of in- 
toxicating liquor in his hand that I do not feel like 
uttering a cry of warning. Depend upon it, Mr. 
Pickering, there is no safe way for a young man, as 


324 


SAVED 


he makes his entry into this world’s busy, exciting 
and, in too many cases, exhausting arena, but that 
of complete abstinence from beverages in which 
alcohol is found.” 

“It certainly has its good as well as its evil 
effects,” said the young man. “Used in modera- 
tion, it serves as a restorative in some cases, and as 
a tonic and vitalizer in many others. And in cer- 
tain forms of disease it is almost a specific ; at least, 
I have so understood.” 

“ I scarcely think you have studied this subject in 
the light of more recent investigations and expe- 
riences,” remarked Mr. Granger. 

“ In truth, I have not studied it at all. But there 
are facts which are commonly known and accepted, 
and these scarcely warrant the complete banishment 
to which our extreme temj)erance advocates would 
subject all kinds of liquor, not excepting beer and 
the lighter wines.” 

“ There are many inferences, and loose sayings, 
and unproved assertions in regard to the beneficial 
effects of alcohol on the human body, as well in 
health as in sickness,” was replied, “ but one after 
another, they are being disproved, until the sub- 
stance called alcohol has, by the ablest chemists and 
pathologists, with only an exception here and there, 
been set over to the side of poisons. It has no food 
value whatever; and its disturbing and disorgan- 
izing effects have become so well known in the 
medical profession, that even the small number of 


AS BY FIRE. 


325 


intelligent pliysicians who hold to its administration 
in certain cases, the range of which grows narrower 
every day, are giving it with great caution and in 
very small doses.” 

“ Is this really so ?” asked the young man, show- 
ing some surprise. 

“ It is just as I have said,” replied Mr. Granger. 
“This whole subject is receiving the most careful 
attention from the best medical experts; and the 
day of guess work and loose generalization is over. 
Nothing will now do for prudent men but rigid 
analysis and clearly-established fact. Let me urge 
upon you, in the outset of life, to give this question 
of the true effect of alcohol on the human system 
an impartial examination ; to challenge a substance 
that works such fearful havoc among men, and 
require it to answer in no uncertain speech. If it 
be a friend of the people, there will be no difficulty 
in establishing the fact ; if an enemy, the case can 
be made equally clear.” 

“Thank you for the suggestion, Mr. Granger,” 
said the young man. “ There is reason in what 
you say. I will look into this matter more care- 
fully, and if I find it as you allege,. I shall not 
hesitate about my future attitude.” 

“ If you will come and see us to-morrow evening, 
I think you will be likely to hear a discussion on 
this subject that will interest you. A few friends 
are coming in, among whom will be a Dr. Gilbert, 
from New York, who has given the subject of in- 


326 


SAVED 


ebriation and tlie action of alcoholic stimulants on 
the human body, a careful study for many years. 
He is no temperance enthusiast, as the people are 
too much inclined to call such men as I am, but a 
cool-headed observer, who will be satisfied with 
nothing in relation to this subject which the most 
perfect methods of chemical analysis and physio- 
logical investigation have not settled. You will be 
impressed with him as a man who knows whereof 
he speaks.” 

“Thank you, Mr. Granger. I shall certainly 
avail myself of the opportunity. It is clear seeing 
that makes right action. But to act where the 
judgment is not convinced is never wise. And this 
is the cause of my hesitation now. I might pro- 
mise you that I would never take wine or brandy ; 
but if I did not think it wrong, for some clearly- 
seen reason, to use these articles, my promise would 
ever after be an annoying impediment, and might 
be broken. But if my promise rests on principle ; 
if I abstain from prudence and judgment ; my atti- 
tude towards the drinking customs of society will 
express my true sentiments, and I shall stand firm 
on the solid ground of my convictions.” 

“ Which will be far better,” returned Mr. Granger. 



CHAPTER XXII. 


SOLID AEGUMENTS. 

O N arriving at Mr. Granger’s, I found a small 
but select company. There were Dr. Gilbert, 
and Judge Arbuckle and his wife, whom I had been 
particularly invited to meet. Mr. Stannard was 
there also ; and a Mrs. K , one of the represen- 

tative women who were actively engaged in the work 
of Christian temperance reform. I had not before 
seen young Henry Pickering, and was attracted by 
his face and bearing ; and particularly so, as it was 
plain, from unmistakable signs, that he was more to 
Amy Granger than an ordinary acquaintance. But 
I did not fail to observe that there was in the atti- 
tude of these young people towards each other a 
certain reserve that was almost embarrassment. 
During the conversation that ensued, and which 
soon drifted into a discussion of the claims of alco- 
hol to have any nutritive or therapeutical value,,! 
was struck by the intentness with which Amy 
watched the young man’s face, as if trying to read his 
thoughts ; and there was, at times, a restlessness in 
her manner that was particularly noticeable, with 
occasional swift changes in the expression of her 
countenance. You saw it light up suddenly when 
some strong point was made by Dr. Gilbert ; and 
327 


328 


SAVED 


this was always accompanied by a glance towards the 
young man who was seated by her side. 

Dr. Gilbert, whom I had not met before, was a 
man about fifty, with a quiet, thoughtful face. You 
saw in his eyes, which were a dark gray, that steady, 
intent expression which comes of earnest thought. 
His mouth was firm, its character harmonizing with 
what you saw in his eyes. You recognized him at 
once as a man with whom neither fancy nor impulse 
could have much influence. 

Judge Arbuckle was another style of man alto- 
gether. He was taller, with a finer muscular de- 
velopment, and a larger head. His eyes were 
darker, and so was his complexion. All his features 
broke into a quicker play, and you perceived at once 
that he was a man of sentiment and feeling as well 
as of intellect and perception, and that in any direc- 
tion in which he might throw himself he would 
display both mental vigor and force of will. 

It was curious to see these two men meet in the 
discussion I had come prepared to hear. But I 
knew enough of the results of recent investigations 
in regard to alcohol, to be very well satisfied about 
the issue, if Dr. Gilbert was as well posted in facts 
and results as I had reason to believe. 

I will not hold the reader in any of the prelimi- 
nary phases and drifts of conversation into which 
the company fell, but bring him in contact therewith 
where the points of interest were clear, and bore 
with distinctive force on the main subject under 


A8 BY FIRE. 


329 


discussion, which, was the affirmation on one side 
that alcohol, if used in moderation, was beneficial, 
and the declaration on the other that its action on 
the human body, except in some very unusual con- 
ditions, was always hurtful. 

“ I claim,” said Judge Arbuckle, “ that wine, and 
in many cases brandy, are necessary articles, both 
in diet and medicine. They assist nature in the 
work of digestion, and give tone to weakened nerves. 
I have seen many lives saved, under conditions of 
extreme prostration, by the use of spirits. In 
typhoid fevers, brandy, as you well know, is the 
physician’s sheet-anchor. Without it, three out of 
every five of his patients would die from simple lack 
of heart-power, which can only be restored through 
active stimulation. In sudden attacks of illness, as 
in faintings, cholics, a suspension of heart-action, or 
exhaustion from fatigue or cold, there is nothing 
that will act so quickly as a glass of brandy. I 
never think of leaving home without a supply ; and 
should regard myself as culpable were I to do so. 
I can point to scores of instances in which a timely 
draught of brandy has saved me from a spell of 
sickness, if it has not saved my life. There is one 
fact that should never be overlooked. Society is 
not in a normal condition. It is overworked. There 
is a strain upon everything, and a conseqnent ex- 
haustion of strength. Nature, always quick in her 
instinct of danger, has, at the same time, as quick 
a perception of the remedy needed ; and her indica- 


330 


SAVED 


tion is unmistakable here. It is stimulation that iSj 
required. All men feel this; and the universal 
resort to stimulants of one kind or another is but 
the natural and necessary response to the demands 
of our exhausted and failing vital forces.” 

The judge spoke with considerable warmth of 
manner, and with a tone and emphasis which ex- 
pressed his firm conviction that the assertions he was 
making were unanswerable. 

“Facts and experience are stubborn things, doc- 
tor,” he closed by remarking ; “ and these we have 
in abundance. But men who have pet theories” — 
he smiled pleasantly as he said it — “ are wonderfully 
skilled in the art of explaining away both.” 

Dr. Gilbert did not seem to be in any haste to 
controvert the judge’s assertions. His first response 
came in the form of a question. 

“ If you were to find a man benumbed with cold, 
what would you do for him ?” 

“ Pour a glass of brandy down his throat as quickly 
as possible.” 

“ For what purpose?” 

“ To heat him up, of course. Heat is life ; cold 
is death.” 

“ Suppose I were to tell you that alcohol lowers 
instead of raising the temperature of the body.” 

“ I would say that you were jesting.” 

“And yet the assertion is true.” 

“ Did you ever take a swallow of brandy ?” 

“Yes.” 


A8 BY FIRE. 


331 


“ Did it make you feel cold or warm ?” 

“ I felt a sense of warmth.” 

“ Burning up even to your face ?” 

“Yes.” 

“ Is heat cold, doctor ?” The judge spoke as one 
who had closed the controversy in a single sentence. 

“ Does heat cause the thermometer to fall ?” asked 
Dr. Gilbert. 

“ I do not see the drift of your question,” replied 
the judge. 

“After the most carefully conducted experiments, 
often repeated,” said the doctor, “ the fact has been 
clearly established that alcohol, instead of imparting 
warmth to the body, actually lowers its tempera- 
ture.” 

Judge Arbuckle shook* his head in a decided 
negative. “ If I take glass of wine or brandy, I 
come into an immediate glow. It doesn’t do to tell 
me that I feel cold. Experiment may prove what 
it can ; but it certainly cannot prove this — at least 
not to my satisfaction. There is such a thing as 
color blindness ; and a like defect may exist in some 
of the other senses. Feeling with some may be 
blind also, and mistake heat for cold.” 

“A young lady blushes,” said the doctor, in reply. 
“You will hardly say that because her cheeks have 
become hot the temperature of her whole body has 
been raised ; but rather infer that the equilibrium of 
heat has been disturbed, or that the capillaries have 
become relaxed and sufiused. An impulse of feeling 
21 


332 


SAVED 


has disturbed the heart’s action, and made its heats 
more violent. Suppose this temporary engorgement 
of the minute blood vessels of the skin were to take 
place, with a sense of heat all over the body, would 
there not be an increased radiation of heat from all 
the surface, and a consequent lowering of the body’s 
temperature, especially with the interior organs?” 

“ But what has the blushing of a young lady to 
do with the colorific or refrigerant effect of a glass 
of brandy ?” asked the judge. 

“ The phenomenon observed in both cases is due 
to the same cause,” said the doctor. “Alcohol re- 
laxes the minuter vessels so that they are unable to 
return the blood promptly to the circulation ; cuta- 
neous engorgements follow, with an increase of sur- 
face heat, and accelerated radiation. The effect on 
the extremities of the nerves is that of a warm glow, 
such as is felt during a reaction from cold. Instead 
of there being an actual increase in the general 
temperature of the body, as the result of alcoholic 
stimulant, a reduction takes place, as has been 
proved over and over again by the thermometer.” 

“ You take me out of my depths here, doctor. I 
have never given much attention to physiology,” 
answered the judge, a little less confident in his 
manner. 

“ But you know what common sense is ; and how 
to deduce conclusions from well-established facts. It 
is the habit of your mind to weigh evidence. Now, 
for the sake of the truth, which is as dear to you as 


AS BY FIRE. 


333 


to any man living, will you not, for a little while, 
take the place of a judge in this controversy, and 
give to the evidence I shall bring against alcohol as 
an enemy to the human race, the grave considera- 
tion it should have ?” 

“ I accept the office to which you so gracefully 
assign me,” replied the judge, smiling. “ But as I 
leave my client without an advocate, I shall claim 
the right to say a word in his behalf if I think you 
treat him unfairly.” 

“As many words as you please. If there is any 
good in him I should like to know it; but I am free 
to say, that the more carefully I investigate his 
claim to he, in any sense, a friend to the human 
race, except for what service he may give in chem- 
istry and the arts, the more complete are my convic- 
tions that he is only an enemy. I cannot find a 
single thing in which the harm of his presence is 
not greater than the good. 

“ But we were talking about the heat-producing 
quality of alcohol. Now, heat is generated through 
the union of oxygen with carbon, by which the latter 
is consumed. There are certain articles of food, such 
as the fat, starches and sugars, which are known as 
heat-producing and force-generating, and chemistry 
is at no loss in regard to them. Their value has 
been determined with the greatest accuracy. The 
amount of heat that each of these substances will 
give when taken into the body has been carefully 
measured, and is known to all in our profession. 


334 


SAVED 


But in regard to alcohol, so long held even by med- 
ical men, to be a heat-producer, animal chemistry 
has not yet been made to detect any evidence of ox- 
idation, the blood showing none of the usual results 
of this process. And now, since we. have been using 
the thermometer as a test of the internal temperature 
of the body, in order to ascertain the heating value 
of foods, or its thermal condition under various dis- 
turbing influences, we find that when alcohol is 
taken there follows a marked reduction of heat. 
The best medical writers now agree on this subject ; 
and some practitioners have even gone so far as to 
administer it in fever as a cooling agent. 

“Even before science had made this discovery 
of the non-heat-generating power of alcohol, arctic 
navigators had learned from experience that the use 
of spirits lessens a man’s ability to withstand cold ; 
and now the extreme northern voyager avoids its 
use altogether, in order to retain sufficient heat to 
sustain him under the intense cold to which he is 
subjected. In the voyage made in search of Sir 
John Franklin, no alcoholic stimulants were used; 
and the northern whaler employs them very spar- 
ingly or not at all.” 

“ Do you remember,” said Mr. Stannard, at this 
point, “ a Pole named Lemonowsky, who, some 
twenty years ago, gave lectures in this country on 
blapoleon ?” 

Some of us remembered him very well. 

“ I mentioned him because of a lecture he gave on 


AS BY FIRE. 


335 


temperance, the facts of which fully corroborate what 
the doctor has just been saying. Lemonowsky, who 
had been an officer in Napoleon’s army, stated, that 
when about leaving home, as a boy, his father placed 
his hand upon • his head, and after declaring that 
intoxicating drinks were the great curse of mankind, 
solemnly conjured him never to touch or taste them; 
and that he gave his father a promise that he never 
would. And all his life he remained true to that 
promise. He took the ground, that the use of alco- 
hol in extreme cold, extreme heat or extreme ex- 
haustion, was dangerous, and often fatal, and, in 
proof of his position, made three statements of re- 
markable facts which had come within his own ob- 
servation and experience. 

“ Lemonowsky accompanied Napoleon in his in- 
vasion of Bussia. He said, that among his imme- 
diate associates in the army were about thirty who, 
like himself, wholly abstained from ardent spirits, 
and that while men who drank freely were dying 
almost like sheep from gangrene and other diseases, 
brought on from exposure to the intense cold, every 
one of these thirty abstainers were in good health, 
and every one came back from that disastrous cam- 
paign. In Egypt, when heat was enervating the 
army, and death rapidly reducing its numbers, the 
men who refused to drink ardent spirits still retained 
their health, and suffered from thirst and heat far 
less than their companions. This intelligent Pole 
then went on to relate how, after the battle of 


336 


SAVED 


Waterloo, and the delivery by the allies of Marshal 
Ney and many of the officers to the F rench at Paris, 
he, with a few others, effected their escape, and put 
to sea in a boat, from which they were taken while 
in the British Channel by a vessel hound to the 
United States. Subsequently this vessel was wrecked 
in a storm, and Lemonowsky found himself again 
upon the sea in an open boat, with nine companions 
and only a small supply of provisions and water. 
These were soon used up, and for many days they 
had nothing to eat or drink. When finally rescued, 
by a vessel bound to Philadelphia, they were in 
such an extreme state of exhaustion that they had 
to be literally carried on board. ‘Immediately,’ 
said the narrator, ‘ on being placed in a berth, the 
ship’s doctor brought me a glass of hot whisky and 
water, and placed it to my lips. But I refused 
to drink it.’ ‘You must, or you will die,’ he said. 
‘Then! told him I would die, for I never had and 
never would ‘drink intoxicating liquor. He got 
angry, and swore at me, and called me a fool. But 
I wouldn’t touch his whisky. Well, gentlemen 
and ladies, I recovered ; but of the nine who were 
taken with me out of the boat, and who took the 
doctor’s stimulating draught, hot even though it 
was, every one died. So, you see, that in extreme 
cold, or heat, or exhaustion, alcohol, so far from 
being useful, is one of the most dangerous sub- 
stances a man can take into his system.’ ” 

“A very striking experience, certainly,” said Dr. 


AS BY FIRE. 


337 


Gilbert, “and one that is entirely in the line of 
legitimate results, as proved by the latest and most 
carefully-conducted experiments. There was a time 
Avhen, if I had heard this story of Lemonowsky’s, I 
would have pronounced it a bit of fancy work, or, 
at least, an exaggeration of an isolated case or tAvo 
which were but exceptions to a rule, the action of 
Avhich was all on the other side. But I can well 
believe, now, that the sturdy old Pole gave truthful 
evidence of which he knew.” 

“ If I understand the case,” remarked Judge 
Arbuckle ; “ I am on the bench, you see, and am 
considering the evidence — the result of some recent 
experiments, and the evidence of a few isolated facts 
are held to disprove the beneficial effects of a sub- 
stance which medical men have used efficiently for 
generations, and which every head of a family has 
administered with success in scores, if not hundreds 
of instances of sudden sickness.” 

“The new and exhaustive tests to which this 
substance has been subjected,” replied Dr. Gilbert, 
“ have nearly all been conducted within the last ten 
years, and so conclusive have been the results, that 
in the International Medical Congress, which met 
last year in Philadelphia, at which over six hun- 
dred delegates from this country and Europe were 
assembled, a report was adopted in which alcohol 
was declared to have no food value whatever, and to 
be so deleterious in its effects on the human organism, 
as to leave a grave doubt Avhether, even as a medr- 


338 


SAVED 


cine in the most extreme cases, it did not do more 
harm than good.” 

“ Not unanimously adopted, certainly.” 

“The facts are simply these. The National 
Temperance Society sent a memorial to this im- 
portant Congress, asking from it a public declara- 
tion to the effect that alcohol should be classed with 
other powerful drugs, and that when prescribed 
medicinally, it should be with conscientious caution 
and a sense of grave responsibility. That it should 
declare it to be in no sense a food for the human 
system, and that its improper use is productive of a 
large amount of physical disease, tending to dete- 
riorate the human race ; and further, to recommend 
to their several nationalities, as representatives of 
enlightened science, a total abstinence from aloholic 
.beverages. The consideration of this memorial was 
referred to the ‘ Section on Medicine,’ in which the 
questions proposed were discussed with marked 
ability and earnestness, resulting in the almost 
unanimous adoption of an elaborate report by Dr. 
Ezra M. Hunt. In this report alcohol is declared 
to have no food value, and to be of doubtful utility 
as a medicine. Indeed, its therapeutic value is 
limited almost exclusively to that of a cardiac 
stimulant in certain extreme cases which often 
admit of substitutions. Of its evil and destructive 
action on the body and brain, a frightful exhibit is 
given. This report, as transmitted by the ‘ Section 
on Medicine’ to the General Congress, was ordered 


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AS BY FIRE. 339 

by tliat body to be sent to the National Temperance 
Society as an answer to its memorial.” 

I was observing the face of J udge Arbuckle while 
Dr. Gilbert was speaking. The grave, almost puz- 
zled expression that came creeping over it, was 
curious to see. The judge had a respect for science, 
learning and authority. The testimony of the old 
Pole, Lemonowsky, went for almost nothing. But 
here was an International Medical Congress of over 
six hundred eminent physicians, representing, of 
course, the highest intelligence of the profession, 
uttering its grave condemnation, and at a word 
sealing up the hottle from which he had been 
drawing his favorite medicament, and declaring its 
use to be hurtful in nearly every case of adminis- 
tration. 

“ I don’t know, doctor,” he said, “ whether I am 
really awake or not; all this is so new and im- 
probable. I shall expect to hear, presently, that a 
beefsteak has its hidden dangers, and that coffee 
will poison as surely as arsenic.” 

“ By their fruits ye shall know them ; and it so 
happens that, in regard to alcohol, there is no diffi- 
culty about the fruit,” returned the doctor. 

“ None whatever in regard to its abuse,” returned 
the judge. “ That is admitted by every one. But 
we are talking of its moderate use as a beverage, and 
of its value as a medicine. Take me, for example. 
I have used more or less wine and spirits for over 
twenty-five years. Few men enjoy better health. 


340 


SAVED 


Except some torpor of the liver, which I believe is 
hereditary,” 

Dr. Gilbert looked steadily into Judge Arbuckle’s 
face for a few moments, as if making a critical 
examination. Then reaching out his hand, he 
said: “Let me feel your pulse, judge.” 

There was a deep pause and silence. 

“ With some slight disturbance of the heart occa- 
sionally,” remarked the doctor, quietly. 

“Very slight. Nothing to speak of,” replied 
the judge, with the manner of one who felt a little 
disturbed. 

“A sinking sensation after exertion, or anxiety, or 
abstinence from food ?” 

“Yes, sometimes.” 

“ Which all comes right after a good, strong glass 
of brandy?” 

“Yes.” 

“ You find this occurring oftener than it did a few 
years ago?” 

“Well, yes. I’m getting older, you see, and 
any organic trouble one may have generally 
increases with age. But, fortunately, I know 
what to do, and have my remedy always at 
hand.” 

“ In some form of alcoholic stimulant ?” 

“ Exactly.” 

“ How often do you resort to this remedy ? Every 
day ?” 

I saw a change of expression in the judge’s face, 


AS BY FIRE. 341 

and a contraction of his brows, as he replied : “Al- 
most every day.” 

“ Especially in the morning before you have taken 
food?” 

“Yes.” 

“ Well, now, Judge Arhuckle,” said the doctor, 
with a grave smile on his face, “ did it never occur 
to you that the remedy you are taking for the relief 
of this trouble is the very agent by which it has 
been produced ?” 

Judge Arhuckle shook his head in a decided 
manner. 

“ And that your torpid liver is only another evi- 
dence of organic deterioration produced by this 
favorite remedy — or shall I say beverage — to which 
you resort so frequently ?” 

“Organic deterioration, doctor!” There was a 
covert alarm in the judge’s voice. 

“There is no substance used by man which pro- 
duces so many and such serious organic deterioration 
as alcohol,” replied the doctor, speaking soberly. 
“ There is not an organ, or delicate nerve, or mem- 
brane, or fluid, or vessel, that it does not hurt by 
contact, or deteriorate if the contact be continued. 
The heart, which is the centre of life, is subjected to 
an excess of strain so long as it is in the system, be- 
cause, being a substance that is never digested, or 
converted into food or force, it hurts and disturbs 
until elimination takes place. But this strain, or 
overwork, is the least of the evils which come from 


342 


SAVED 


the presence of alcohol. The changes and deteriora- 
tions of structure, and in the condition of the blood, 
which take place in consequence of the presence of 
alcohol, are of a most serious character. Let me try 
to make this plain. The whole surface of the body, 
and every particular organ, muscle, nerve, blood- 
vessel, and even the bones, are enveloped in sheaths 
or coverings called the membranes. Besides the first 
apparent use of these membranes, many of which 
serve as enveloping bandages, by which all the 
structures are held together in perfect order, they 
have a still more important use in the animal econo- 
my. They are the filters of the body, and without 
them there could be no building of the structures 
they line or enclose. The food w^e take contains all 
the various things required for the life and health of 
the body ; albumen, caesin and vegetable film for 
tissue building ; fat, sugar and starch for the produc- 
tion of heat and force ; water as the general solvent, 
and salt for constructive and other purposes. These 
have, after digestion, to be arranged in the body, 
which is done by the membranes, through which 
nothing can pass which is not, for the time, in a state 
of aqueous solution. Water passes freely through 
them, and so do soluble salts ; but the constructive 
albuminous matter does not pass until it is chemi- 
cally decomposed. Upon their integrity all the 
silent work of building up the body depends. If 
these membranes are rendered too porous, and let 
out the tissue-building fiuids of the blood, the body 


AS BY FIRE. 


343 


dies gradually, as if it were being slowly bled to 
death ; if, on the contrary, they become condensed or 
thickened, they fail to let the natural fluids pass 
through them, and the result is either an accumula- 
tion of fluids in a closed cavity, or the contraction 
of the substance enclosed within the membrane, or 
a dryness of membranous surfaces which ought to 
be freely lubricated and kept apart. 

“ Now, the most carefully-conducted experiments 
have educed the fact that upon all the membranous 
structures alcohol exerts a direct and perverting 
action. It produces in them a thickening, a shrink- 
ing and an inactivity that reduces their functional 
power. That they may. work rapidly and equally, 
they require to be at all times charged with water to 
saturation ; and an agent that deprives them of any 
portion of this water interferes with their work, and 
lays the foundation of structural derangements and 
deteriorations that are often fatal in the end. Alco- 
hol is an agent which possesses, in a high degree, 
this power of absorbing water ; and as soon as it is 
taken into the body it begins the work of absorption. 
Dr. Hunt, in his report to the Medical Congress, 
says : ‘ The power alcohol has of drying secretions, 
and congesting membranes, is unsurpassed by any 
known remedy in general use and Dr. Richard- 
son, in his Cantor Lectures on Alcohol, dwells par- 
ticularly on this point in his startling exhibit of the 
destructive effects of alcohol when taken into the 
human body.” 


CHAPTEE XXIII. 


THE EVIDENCE COMPLETE. 


OU almost take my breath away, doctor!” 



-L exclaimed Judge Arbuckle, affecting a 
lightness of tone that did not wholly conceal the 
more serious impression which these charges against 
alcohol, as an enemy to the animal organism, had 
produced on his mind. “ I was going to ask you in 
what specific manner this substance affects the heart 
and the liver ; but I’m half afraid.” 

“ The best way to deal with any danger, is to look 
it steadily in the face, and measure its power for 
evil,” replied the doctor, “ Let us take the heart, 
which, by its propelling force, sends the blood along 
the arteries. One of the first effects of alcohol is a 
temporary relaxation or paralysis of the minuter 
blood-vessels, which shows itself often, as I said a 
little while ago, in a sensation of heat. This causes 
the heart to beat more quickly. The vessels through- 
out the whole body become dilated, and are held in 
a state of unnatural relaxation and unnatural tension. 
If the use of alcoholic drinks is continued, the per- 
sistent pressure causes, in the course of time, a change 
in the diameters of these vessels, and the whole mar- 
velous web- work of blood, upon which the organs of 
the body are constructed, is deranged. Soon the 


344 


AS BY FIRE. 


345 


functions of the heart become perverted — for it 
cannot escape the ‘effects of stimulation. If, to-day, 
under the excitement of wine or spirits, it gives 
twenty-five thousand strokes in twenty-four hours 
more than its usual number, it cannot to-morrow 
sink back to the old rate without experiencing some 
disturbance, some feebleness, or some hesitation. 
And is it not fair to conclude that an organ which, 
by its own stroke feeds its own substance with 
blood, must be among the first to suffer from irregu- 
lar supplies of blood ? As stimulation goes on in- 
creasing, the heart, whipped to greater efforts, 
gradually enlarges, as the arm does by excessive use ; 
its exquisite valves, subjected to prolonged strain, 
are drawn out of their fine proportion ; the orifices, 
through which the great currents of blood issue in 
their course, are dilated ; the minute chords which 
hold the valves in position and tension are elon- 
gated ; and the walls of the ventricles are thickened. 
All this is, of course, very gradual, and nature, ever 
on the alert for defense or repair, holds her own, as 
far as possible, against the enemy that is assaulting 
her, and disputes the ground inch by inch, and for 
a long time so successfully, that but few outward 
signs of the evil work that is going on make them- 
selves visible. But the time comes when her power 
of resistance fails, and when deteriorations of organic 
tissues begin. The membranous envelope and 
lining of the heart thickens, becomes cartilaginous, 
and even b6ny. To this may succeed degenerative 


346 


SAVED 


clianges in the muscular tissues of the heart, by 
which the power of contraction may he reduced, or 
fatty cells may begin to replace the muscular struc- 
ture. So insidiously do these organic changes 
progress, that those who are suffering from them 
are scarcely aware of the mischief until it is far 
advanced. They are for years conscious of a failure 
of central power, which they try to restore by the 
very stimulation that produced the failure, until, in 
the end, the remedy ceases to act ; whip and spur 
can do no more, and the poor, jaded, overworked 
heart gives up the hopeless struggle.” 

“And the man dies,” said the judge, in a half- 
incredulous voice. Buj; his manner was very grave. 

“That event may be long delayed; for nature 
never yields an inch of ground so long as she can 
defend it, and when forced to retire, usually does it 
slowly, fighting as she retreats. It often happens 
that, before the heart gives up the struggle, other 
vital organs are subdued — the brain, the liver or 
the lungs. Sometimes paralysis or apoplexy ends 
the contest. Indeed, death comes from a wide range 
of diseases, which have their origin in alcoholic 
deteriorations. No man, who uses the substance 
habitually is a sound man. He cannot bear ex- 
posure, or sudden changes of the temperature, or 
the subtle invasion of epidemics, near so well as the 
man who never permits the poison to enter his 
system.” 

“ You think my torpid liver comes from the 


AS BY FIRE. 347 

presence of alcohol in my system?” said the 
judge. 

“ I have very little doubt of it ; for it is on that 
organ that alcohol most frequently works structural 
changes,” replied Dr. Gilbert. “The liver has a 
remarkable capacity for holding active substances in 
its cellular parts. In cases of poisoning from arsenic, 
strychnine and other substances, we turn at once to 
the liver as the place of chief deposit for foreign 
matter. Alcohol finds its way there promptly ; and 
we might say that, with the free drinker of ardent 
spirits, it is almost continually saturated with it. 
The effect of alcohol on the liver is to retard free 
secretion and the passage of fluids. The organ 
enlarges at first from the distension of its vessels 
and the thickening of its tissues. Afterwards there 
follows a contraction of membrane, and a slow 
shrinking of the whole mass of the organ in its 
cellular parts. Dr. Richardson, in his Cantor Lec- 
tures, to which I have referred, clearly describes 
this process. Of course, as in other alcoholic poi- 
soning, the change is slow, and the subject of it 
rarely suspects the cause of his trouble. When the 
liver has become a shrunken, hardened mass, 
dropsy in the lower extremities appears, and the 
case becomes hopeless. Sometimes, in these ex- 
treme changes, a fatty degeneration takes place.” 

I saw the judge glance down at his feet and move 
them, I thought, a little uneasily, when Dr. Gilbert 
spoke of dropsy in the lower extremities; and I 
22 


348 


SAVED 


fancied that the face of Mrs. Arbuckle changed 
suddenly. There was a pause, which no one seemed 
for awhile inclined to break. 

“If all this be so, doctor,” Judge Arbuckle’s 
brows were drawn closely together, “ what are we to 
do with the fact that in typhoid fevers brandy is 
relied upon almost as much as if it were a specific 
for that disease ? If alcohol is such an enemy to 
the human body, how can it act as a friend here ? 
Poison is poison, and works destructively, whether 
he who takes it be sick or well.” 

“ Does your physician make free use of brandy 
in typhoid fever ?” 

“ He did as late as six months ago,” replied the 
judge. “ But now, that we are talking on this sub- 
ject, I recall the fact that since then one of my 
neighbors, whose daughter was down with this 
fever, sent him away and called in another physi- ‘ 
cian, because milk punch was interdicted. My 
neighbor would not take the risk of any experi- 
ments with his child. He had always seen milk 
punch given freely in typhoid fever, and as Dr. 

D refused to let it be given, on the ground 

that he had adopted some new theory of cure, he 

was discharged, and the case given to Dr. L , 

who held strictly to the old mode of treatment.” 

“ What was the result.” 

“ It was a very bad attack. I remember it all 

now. Dr. D was severely blamed by the family 

for his treatment of the case while it was in his 


AS BY FIRE. 


349 


hands. He let it sink so low for lack of stimula- 
tion, that when brandy was given it was too late to 
produce any reactive effect.” 

“ And the patient died ?” 

“Yes.” 

“ Killed by the brandy, most likely. Nature had 
all that she could do to fight single-handed with her 
enemy. To give him a recruit was to make his 
victory sure.” 

“ You speak very confidently. Dr. Gilbert.” 

“ Because I speak from the stand-point of accu- 
rate knowledge in regard to the action of alcohol, 
as well as from the experience and observation of 
the most enlightened men in our profession. No 
physician, who has kept pace with the advance of 
medical science in the past few years, would now 
dare to risk the life of his patient, or to retard his 
cure, by giving him alcohol freely in any serious 
illness. If administered at all, it would be in very 
small doses, and with an exceeding close observation 
of its effects. If I had you in my library, I could 
refer you to the recorded testimony ili medical jour- 
nals, treatises and text-books of the most distin- 
guished and trustworthy members of the profession 
in this country and Europe, on the subject of the 
use of alcohol in disease ; and with scarcely an ex- 
ception, it is unfavorable. Where its use is now sanc- 
tioned at all, it is under the strictest limitations, and 
with the greatest , injunctions of caution. Prof. 
Loomis, of New York city, who does not entirely 


350 


SAVED 


exclude alcoliol in his treatment of typhoid fever, 
says,- that in this disease the experience of very few 
physicians is such as to enable them to determine 
from the patient’s appearance, when the administra- 
tion of stimulants should be commenced, and that 
where there is reasonable doubt as to the propriety 
of giving or withholding, it is better to withhold 
them. He admits a possible value, but admonishes 
the physician when prescribing alcohol to his pa- 
tient in this disease to see him at least every two 
hours, and to watch the effect with the greatest care. 
Dr. Hunt, while approving this extremely guarded 
use, says, that many excellent practitioners rely 
wholly on ammonia, ethers and foods in such 
cases.” 

“ The evidence against my client continues to ac- 
cumulate,” said the judge, with something like a 
grim smile on his face. “Anything more. Dr. 
Gilbert?” 

“ The testimony, if all were taken,” replied the 
doctor, “would require this court to remain in session 
for weeks, and if printed, would fill many volumes. 
There are a few things more which I would like to 
say, if you have patience to hear them. The pris- 
oner at the bar, your honor, is an exceedingly dan- 
gerous fellow ; and it may be well to permit those 
who know him best, and who understand his hidden 
and subtle ways, and the evils that are wrought by 
his hands, to offer stilt further evidence against him. 
Richardson says of alcohol, that it dries the liver, 


A8 BY FIRE. 


351 


the stomach and the lungs ; and even steals moisture 
from the corpuscles of the blood ; and more thah any 
other article in .common use, initiates degeneration of 
important organs. A claim has been made for al- 
cohol that it fattens the body, if that be a desirable 
result. Many beer-drinkers certainly do become 
fat ; but as a substance which contains no fatty ma- 
terial cannot produce fat, investigation may naturally 
seek for a reason in the pathological effects of alco- 
hol. It is found that the individual so fattened in- 
variably diminishes in physical activity, and in the 
power of endurance in proportion to his increase of 
weight ; and this is held to be due to a degenerative 
change in the more actively vital materials of the 
body, and the slow accumulation of uneliminated 
carbonacious material. It is really disease and not 
health; the product of a degenerative and not a 
normal process. If alcohol can serve the human 
body no better than this, the body might well dis- 
pense with its service. 

“As a digester, alcohol has a wide reputation. 
Men take it before a meal to prepare the stomach 
for its work, and with and after a meal to assist it in 
doing its work. Now, what has the medical pro- 
fession to say on this subject; and what is the re- 
sult of careful test, analysis and observation ? One 
authority declares that alcohol, when added to the 
digestive fluid, ‘produces a white precipitate, which 
suspends digestion;’ and Richardson declares that 
of all the systems of organs- that suffer from the use 


352 


SA VED 


of alcohol, two, viz : the digestive and the nervous, 
are effected most determinately. The stomach, he 
remarks, being unable, because of the presence of 
alcohol, to produce, in proper quantity, the natural 
digestive fluid, and also unable to absorb the food 
which, in consequence, is but imperfectly digested, 
becomes affected with anxiety and irritation, or op- 
pressed with nausea, or with a sense of distension, 
or with a loathing for food, or an tinnatural craving 
for drink. This self-inflicted disease, as it becomes 
confirmed, is called dyspepsia ; and the sufferer, in- 
stead of giving up his wine, or spirits, takes pills, or 
pours into his poor abused stomach floods of effer- 
vescing and mineral waters ; does, in fact, a hundred 
foolish things by which he is made worse. Between 
his drinking and his medicine, he increases his indi- 
gestion, until it takes on a chronic form, and all 
enjoyment of life is over,” 

“ One might infer from all this,” the judge here 
remarked, “ that our prisoner at the bar is responsi- 
ble for all the ills that flesh is heir to.” 

“ His responsibility,” replied the doctor, “ has a 
far wider range than most people imagine. The 
consumption of spirits, wine, ale and beer reaches, 
annually, in this country, the enormous amount of 
over three hundred millions of gallons. Is it possible 
for the people to consume this vast quantity of a bev- 
erage containing from two or three to over sixty per 
cent, of a substance which, in the words of Hr, 
Hunt, is ‘beyond dispute, fraught with the most 


AS BY FIRE. 


oOo 


prevalent and direful results to the physical struct- 
ure/ without a serious impairment of the public 
health in the reduction of vital power, and in func- 
tional derangements, which lay the foundations of 
diseases which too often bafile the physician’s skill ? 
I say nothing of the ills that afflict our social 
life, which are more terrible, even, than the ills 
from which our bodies .suffer. One medical writer 
says of alcohol : ‘ It helps time to produce the effects 
of age ; it is the genius of degeneration.’ Another 
says : ‘ Practical medicine tells us that three-quarters 
of all diseases in adults who drink at all are caused 
thereby,’ and farther, that, ‘ the capacity of the 
alcohols for impairment of functions and the initia- 
tion and promotion of organic lesion in vital parts, 
is unsurpassed by any record in the whole range of 
medicine ;’ these facts being so fully granted by the 
jorofession as to be no longer debatable. But why 
continue to accumulate evidence ? If wdiat I have 
stated be not sufflcient to convict the accused, it 
would be a waste of time to bring other allegations 
against him.” 

Judge Ar buckle’s fine face lighted up as he 
grasped the hand of Dr. Gilbert, and said : “ I must 
declare the evidence to be complete ; and confess, at 
the same time, that I have been too much prejudiced 
against temperance reformers, as a class, to give this 
subject the careful and honest investigation it should 
long ago have received at my hands. We cling to 
old prejudices sometimes with an unreasoning tenaci- 


354 


SAVED 


ty, you know. But is tlie statement just made by 
you taken from official returns ? — the one in regard 
to the enormous consumption of intoxicating drinks 
in this country ?” 

“ It is from Dr. Hargreaves’ important work, 
‘ Our Wasted Resources,’ which ought to he care- 
fully studied by every intelligent man who feels an 
interest in the welfare of his country, and in the 
well-being of the people. The statements given are, 
of course, authentic. And let me refer you, also, to 
the exhaustive report on ‘Alcohol as a Food and 
Medicine,’ made to the recent Medical Congress, by 
Dr. Ezra W. Hunt, which has been published in a 
volume of nearly a hundred and fifty pages ; and 
to Dr. Richardson’s able lectures on alcohol. These 
works are candid, honest and thorough, and offer 
abundant means for an examination of this great 
subject, on the right treatment and adjustment of 
which hang such vast results of good or evil. I shall 
feel that a cause which my judgment approves, and 
in which my feelings are deeply interested, has 
gained a large accession of strength, if you, Judge 
Arbuckle, should, from conviction and principle, 
range yourself upon the side of its friends. That 
cause is known as Total Abstinence.” 

The light which had come breaking into Judge 
Arbuckle’s face, as he grasped the doctor’s hand, 
faded out slowly, a sober, thoughtful, indeterminate 
expression coming in its stead. “Total abstinence!” 
Ever since he could remember, these two words had 


AS BY FIRE. 


855 


been, in his mind, the synonym for ignorant and 
meddlesome fanaticism ; and he had felt something 
like contempt for men who could let the glass of 
generous wine pass them untasted. He must be a 
poor milk-sop, or cold, mean and unsocial, who 
could do this, he thought. In standing consciously 
above this class, in his use of “ a beverage fit for the 
gods,” the judge had enjoyed a feeling of superiority, 
and a sense of more affluent manhood. It is no 
cause of wonder, then, that his countenance became 
exceedingly grave and thoughtful. Had these men 
been the really wise ones ? Had they been of the 
prudent, who, foreseeing the evil, hide themselves, 
while he, passing on with the simple, had been pun- 
ished ? I saw that a great conflict was going on in 
his mind ; and I saw, too, that his wife was watching 
him with an intensity of interest which she made 
no effort to conceal. 

“Total abstinence, doctor!” The judge shook 
his head. “ I believe in moderation. And all you 
have said as to the bad effects of the alcohol con- 
tained in wine and spirits, only makes moderation 
the more imperative.” 

The judge had risen to his feet. In doing so, I 
noticed a slight stiffness of movement. He straight- 
ened himself up rather slowly, placing one hand 
tightly above his right hip, and holding it there for 
a few moments. Then he stepped out and walked 
across the room. There was, at first, a perceptible 
limp in one leg ; but it was soon gone. 


356 


SAVED 


Dr. Gilbert smiled, as he said : “ Getting a little 
stiff, judge ?” 

“ Yes,” was answered good humoredly. “ We are 
none of us as young as we were twenty years ago.” 

“A man ought to be called young at fifty,” re- 
plied the doctor. “And neither you nor I have 
gone far, if at all, beyond that age.” 

“ Fifty-one,” said the judge. 

“ In advance of me less than a year. This should 
be the age of full vigor. Every organ and function 
in the body, if there has been no overstrain, nor 
exposure to morbific causes, ought to be in their 
highest activity. The filtering and lubricating 
membranes that line and inclose the joints, should 
be in perfect health ; and so should the membranes 
that sheathe the muscles and nerves, and enfold and 
line the vital organs. It is too soon for age to 
impair the action, or to dry the fluids of any part 
of the body’s wonderful mechanism.” 

“ I don’t know about that, doctor,” returned the 
judge. “ I am acquainted with a great many men 
who have reached fifty, and there is scarcely one of 
them who is not beginning to show signs of ap- 
proaching age.” 

“What about their habits? Are they strictly 
temperate men? Total abstinence from alcoholic 
drinks, I mean ?” 

“ No. They are for the most part, good, gener- 
ous livers, but not given to excess, except, perhaps, 
in a few cases.” 


AS BY FIRE. 


357 


Dr. Gilbert smiled, as be said : “ Tbe effects of 
arsenic, when taken into the stomach moderately, 
have been carefully observed and recorded, and are 
so well known to the physician, that he rarely, if 
ever, mistakes therq. Now, if he were called to see 
a patient who had been indulging in the moderate 
use of arsenic, and found all the indications of 
arsenic poison about him, would he not fairly con- 
clude that it was arsenic, and not old age or any- 
thing else that was working the mischief. The 
case with your friends is in exact parallel with this. 
The effects of alcoholic poison have been as carefully 
noted and recorded as that produced by arsenic. 
We know just what it does in the human body, and 
how it does it, and what the indications of its health- 
destroying actions are. And when we see a man 
who regularly uses alcohol in any of its forms, 
suffering from the troubles which we know alcohol 
produces, we naturally assign the cause of his ail- 
ments to the poison he has taken. If we find him 
troubled with sciatica, and know, as we do, that 
alcohol perverts the membranous coverings of the 
nerves, and gives rise to pressure within the sheath 
of the nerve, and to pain in consequence, we 
natually infer that the origin of his trouble lies in 
the poison of alcohol. If the neuralgia is in the 
face, commencing at some point where a nerve 
passes through an opening in the bone, as near the 
centre of the chin, or in front of the lower part of 
the ear, or over the eye, and we know that alcohol 


358 


SAVED 


thickens, as I have shown, the sheath of the nerve, 
we do not hesitate to conclude that this thickening 
has gone on until the bony openings have become 
too small, and congestion and intense suffering are 
the consequence. If one of our moderate-drinking 
patients has any of the troublesome forms of indi- 
gestion, we refer the cause to the alcohol contained 
in his favorite beverage, for we know that alcohol 
not only retards instead of promoting digestion, but 
weakens and diseases the stomach. If he is afflicted 
with insomnia, we see in this most serious condition 
the result of the relaxation of the blood-vessels of 
the brain, caused by the presence of alcohol, and 
their consequent inability to return the blood 
promptly to the heart; or if his sleep be heavy and 
apoplectic in character, we know that this relaxation 
of the blood-vessel is so great as to result in en- 
gorgement and danger. If there is fatty degenera- 
tion of the heart, or kidneys, or liver, we know that 
alcohol will do this very thing. If we find Bright’s 
disease, we know that the action of alcohol is to 
deteriorate the lining membranes of the kidneys, by 
which they may lose their power to retain and 
rightly dispose of the albuminous material out of 
which the tissues of the body are constructed, and 
let it pass through and be drained from the system, 
which, in the end, is certain death. I could go on 
and show how nearly every organic disease with which 
our poor bodies are afflicted, may have its origin in 
the deteriorations or obstructions caused by alcohol.” 


AS BY FIRE. 


359 


“But, doctor, we have ‘tic,’ and sciatica, and in- 
somnia, and albuminuria, and all the diseases you 
mention in persons who make no use of wine, or 
beer, or spirits.” 

“Of course we have,” was replied. “ I did not 
mean to say that only alcohol causes these maladies. 
I was speaking of persons who were habitual 
drinkers ; and the conclusion I wished to press was, 
that as alcohol would produce the diseases from 
which they were suffering, it was but fair to assume 
that alcohol was the responsible agent in their spe- 
cial cases of suffering.” 

“There are hereditary tendencies to many ’dis- 
eases, you know, doctor,” said the judge, speaking 
with the manner of one who was being driven from 
his entrenchments, and with little more than a sug- 
gestion in his voice. 

“The greater reason why we should carefully 
avoid everything that will excite these tendencies,” 
returned the doctor. “If there be one substance 
which, above all others, in common use among 
men, disturbs the vital functions, and works 
unhealthy changes in every particular thing in 
the body which it touches, will not that substance 
be sure to give to all hereditary susceptibilities 
to disease a quickening force ? It cannot be other- 
wise.” 

The judge returned to his chair ; and as he sat 
down, drew his handkerchief from his pocket and 
wiped away the perspiration which had collected on 


360 


SAVED 


liis forehead. The expression of his countenance 
was still more thoughtful and serious. 

“ Passing from the physical to the mental,” said 
Dr. Gilbert, “ and we come to the higher and more 
appalling forms of disaster which spring from the 
drinking customs of society. Are you at all familiar 
with these. Judge Arbuckle ?” 

“ I am aware that many cases of insanity are at- 
tributed to intemperance ; and I can easily see that 
confirmed ^drunkenness must tend to impair the 
mental as well as the bodily powers,” returned the 
judge. 

“Is it not clear,” resumed the doctor, “that a 
substance which attacks and injures every functional 
structure in the body, niust seriously affect that 
delicate and wonderful piece of mechanism, the 
brain? The moment you disturb this organ, you 
disturb the mind. You may hurt the hand, or the 
foot, or almost any other organ or member of the 
body, and yet thought may remain clear, and the 
intellect balanced ; but touch the brain — congest its 
finer blood-vessels, thicken its delicate membranes 
and impair the quality of the nervous matter they 
inclose, and a new peril begins. Before, it was only 
the physical man that was in danger ; now it is the 
rational and the moral man. A deterioration of 
brain-structure has commenced, which, if not ar- 
rested, may terminate in insanity. That it does so 
terminate we know, for of the inmates of our insane 
asylums, from fifteen to twenty per cent, have been 


AS BY FIRE. 


361 


reduced to their melancholy condition through in- 
temperance. The percentage would be placed much 
higher, if we included all the cases wherein the 
brain had been so much injured by alcohol as to be 
unable to bear the shock of misfortune, bereavement 
or humiliation, by which the reason has been de- 
throned. 

“ Men who are in good health rarely break down 
and lose their reason in consequence of business dis- 
asters, keen disappointments or domestic afflictions. 
I do not hesitate to affirm — and, as a physician, I 
know of what I speak — that no man who regularly 
uses any beverage in which alcohol is present, is, or 
can be, in perfect health, or in the full and undis- 
turbed possession of his mental faculties. He is, in 
the degree that he uses this substance, sound neither 
in mind nor body, and is exposed to more imminent 
dangers than men who abstain from its use alto- 
gether. He cannot endure the same amount of 
pliysical or mental strain that he might have done 
if there had been no impairment of function or 
faculty. Now, a point that I wish to urge, is this : 
while we are not responsible, as moral beings, for 
the sins of our fathers, there is laid upon us, under 
the law of transmission, a sad heritage of diseased 
tendencies, both of body and mind, coming down to 
us through many generations — arrested and modified 
in one, and intensified, it may be, in another. As we 
take this legacy, it is only in the form of a latent 
force. If our lives be strictly in the line of natural 


362 


SAVED 


and spiritual laws ; if we shun excess of every kind, 
and hold the appetite and passions in check, we may 
keep that latent force inactive and harmless. But 
if, on the contrary, we indulge our appetites and pas- 
sions, and disobey the laws of natural and spiritual 
health, then we come into the possession of this evil 
legacy, and into the disorders and sufferings it en- 
tails; transmitting it with an intenser vitality, it 
may be, to the generation that comes after us. Just 
what this legacy of evil tendencies may be in your 
case or mine, neither of us can know until we violate 
some law of natural or spiritual health, impelled 
thereto, it may be, by its hidden motions. Then it 
first begins to gain power over us. There may be 
an inherited taint of insanity, intemperance or con- 
sumption, which an orderly life and good health 
may keep from ever showing itself. But let such 
a health-disturbing element as alcohol get into the 
body and brain, and who may foretell the conse- 
quences.” 




CHAPTEE XXIV. 


THE HAPPY CONCLUSION. 



.UEING the whole of this time, scarcely a re- 


mark had been made by any one except the 
judge and Dr. Gilbert; but all were attentive listeners ; 
none more so than young Henry Pickering and Amy 
Granger. My attention had been drawn towards 
them from the first, and the impression soon came to 
me that the young man’s attitude towards the question 
under discussion had not been altogether such as the 
maiden approved. But it was plain now, that Dr. 
Gilbert’s evidence, so clearly stated, had made a deep 
impression on his mind. He turned to Amy, as 
the doctor closed his remarks, and spoke to her very 
earnestly for a few moments. The effect was strik- 
ing. Her face lighted up gradually until it was as 
if a sunbeam had fallen over it, while her beautiful 
eyes became almost radiant. 

“ For one,” said Mr. Stannard, the first to break 
the silence that followed, turning to Dr. Gilbert as 
he spoke, “ I must express my thanks for the clear 
explanation you have given us of the physical effects 
of alcohol. We, the people, need instruction on 
this subject. It is because of our lack of reliable 
information here, that so many go on impairing 
health, and laying the foundation of incurable 
23 863 


364 


SAVED 


diseases. If this were all ; if the use of a substance 
so destructive to the body did not lead, as you loave 
just intimated, to other and more appalling disas- 
ters. Among these, you have referred to insanity. 
Ah ! if there were nothing else, this would be bad 
enough. But among the evils that it inflicts on our 
race, insanity, I had almost said, is among the light- 
est. Of its agency in making criminals. Judge 
Arbuckle is, perhaps, as well informed as any one 
present.” 

The judge, who had been sitting with his eyes 
bent to the floor, almost started at the mention of 
his name, his absence of thought had been so great. 

“What were you saying?” he asked, glancing 
towards Mr. Stannard. 

“ Only that you were probably better informed 
than any one present as to the direct agency of al- 
cohol in making criminals.” 

“There is no gainsaying the fact,” replied the 
judge, with much gravity of manner, “ that a very 
large number of the crimes for which men are tried 
and punished, have their origin, or secondary ex- 
citing cause in liquor-drinking.” 

“ Statistics,” remarked Mr. Granger, “ tell a sad 
story as to the crime, destitution, suffering and pau- 
perism which spring from this one source. The 
figures are indeed startling. I have looked at the 
hundreds of poor wretched creatures who gathered 
nightly at our meeting on Broad Street, and read 
in their faces the sad story of their fall and degra- 


AS BY FIRE. 


365 


dation; my thought has gone to the homes made 
desolate ; to the broken-hearted wives and mothers ; 
to the abused and neglected children, that must he 
counted in as a part of the ruin involved in what I 
saw before me. At a single glance, I have taken in as 
many as from three to five hundred of these wretched 
beings, with faces and forms so marred and disfigured 
that it made my heart ache to look at them ; and for 
every individual I saw before me, somewhere, away 
out of sight and observation, were from one to half 
a score of wronged and suffering ones, who, but for 
the debasement of these men, might have been 
living in comfort and happiness. This is the 
thought that intensifies our pity and stirs our com- 
passion when we look at even a single one of these 
wrecks of humanity. 

“ But when we begin to aggregate these human 
disasters, the result becomes appalling. We take 
an isolated home. It is the dwelling-place of sweet 
content. But the demon of drink comes in, and 
beauty fades, and peace retires, and sorrow, and 
j)ain, and unutterable woe take up their abode in 
the desolate habitation ; or it is thrown down and 
utterly destroyed. How sad we grow over a single 
case like this, when it comes clearly before us. 
What, then, is the fearful aggregate? Statistics 
place the great army of drunkards in this country 
at six hundred thousand ! It may be more, it may 
be less. Do we place the average too great when we 
say, that, for every one of these, five persons are 


366 


SAVED 


hurt in some way — fathers, mothers, wives, children, 
sisters, brothers or dependents ? Three millions of 
persons involved in the debasement and ruin of 
these six hundred thousand ! What an awful ag- 
gregate, when we comprehend just what this debase- 
ment and ruin means and involves ! Then statistics 
tell us that, from two to three hundred thousand 
children are yearly deserted, or orphaned, and sent 
to poor-houses, or bequeathed to private and public 
charities, in consequence of intemperance; to say 
nothing of the little ones who perish from neglect 
and cruelty. Of the crimes committed, our news- 
papers and our police, our courts and prison records 
make perpetual advertisement, until the awful facts 
become so familiar that the public grow hardened 
and almost indifferent. In a single year, in the 
State of New York, according to one of the reports 
of the Prison Association, not less than from sixty 
to seventy thousand persons, men,' women and 
children, were committed to the jails of that com- 
monwealth, and seven-eighths of these commitments, 
according to the estimates of the prison-keepers, 
were due either directly or indirectly to the use of 
intoxicating liquors. The estimates of leading tem- 
perance writers as to the number of men and women 
who are yearly sent to prison in consequence of 
using strong drink, give the figures at one hundred 
thousand ; but taking the returns of New York as 
a basis of calculation, and they swell to more 
startling numbers. 


AS BY FISK 


367 


“ The mortality of drunkenness is another aspect 
of the case fearful to contemplate. Sixty thousand 
are said to die annually in this country from the 
direct effects of inebriety; and where epidemics 
attack a community, the intemperate, and those who 
use alcoholic drinks regularly, are the first to yield 
to their malign influences. A remarkable instance 
of this is given in a letter written to the Boston 
Medical Journal, in 1853, by Dr. Carnwright, of 
New Orleans. The yellow fever, he said, came down 
like a storm on the devoted city, sweeping off five 
thousand intemperate men, before, so far as he was 
able to get at the facts, a single sober man was 
touched by the epidemic. A Liverpool coroner 
made public declaration, that gin caused him to 
hold annually a thousand more inquests than would ■ 
otherwise have been the case ; and he said, farther, 
that he had seen, since holding the office of coroner, 
so many murders by poison, by drowning, by hang- 
ing and by cutting the throat, in consequence of 
drinking ardent spirits, that he was astonished that 
the legislature did not interfere to stop the sale of 
intoxicating liquor. It was his belief, that from ten 
to fifteen thousand persons died annually in that 
metropolis from the effects of gin-drinking. 

“ Looking beyond the questions of health, mor- 
tality and personal suffering involved in the use of 
intoxicants, the loss to the whole people in material 
prosperity is something startling. If, as has been 
established over and over again by the testimony of 


368 


SAVED 


judges, grand juries and prison-keepers, from sixty 
to eighty per cent, of the heavy cost of maintaining 
courts, prisons and almshouses, is due to the crime 
and pauperism engendered by drinking, we have in 
this item alone a vast drain upon the productive 
industry of the country. What this drain is may 
he seen from a single fact. In Ulster County, New 
York, a committee was appointed to ascertain from 
reliable sources, the percentage on every dollar of 
tax paid to the county which was required for the 
support of her paupers, and the prosecution and 
maintainance of her criminals; and, after careful 
examination, it was announced, that on every dollar 
of tax paid, sixty-three cents was the penalty ex- 
acted from the people for permitting the liquor 
traffic to be carried on in that county. But this is 
only a single item. The loss in productive labor 
suffered through the voluntary or enforced idleness 
of six or seven hundred thousand drunken men, 
paupers and criminals, to say nothing of the reduced 
power of work and production that inevitably attends 
moderate drinking, as it is called, adds an additional 
drawback to the general prosperity. There is yet 
another view of this case. Hundreds of thousands 
of bushels of grain, instead of going to feed the 
people, are annually used for the production of bev- 
erages which injure the health of all who drink 
them, and create an army of paupers and criminals. 
The amount paid for these beverages by those who 
drink them, is from eight hundred to a thousand 


A8 BY FIRE, 


369 


millions of dollars every year, or more than the 
value of all the flour, cotton goods, hoots and shoes, 
woolen goods, clothing, books and newspapers pro- 
duced in the whole country. A government of the 
people, by the people, and for the people, can hardly 
be called, in all things, a wise government, so long 
as it fosters and protects, by legal enactment, and 
draws a part of its revenue, from a traffic like this, 
which offers no good to the people, but mars their 
industry, corrupts their politics, and sows crime, 
pauperism, disease and death broadcast over the 
land. Is it not time that the citizens of this great 
nation called a halt ; and time that every man who 
holds in regard the well-being of his neighbor, and 
the happiness and safety of his children, should 
come out from among the friends of so monstrous 
an evil, and set himself resolutely to the work of 
its repression ?” 

“The work of repression is a very slow and 
halting work,” came in the clear, calm voice of a 

woman, and I turned towards Mrs. K , who had 

been silent up to this time. Judge Arbuckle, who 
had been listening with a grave, judicial attention 
to Mr. Granger, almost started at the sound of her 
voice, and looked at her with a lifting of his eye- 
brows, and awakened surprise on his countenance. 
“ Its progress, if there be really any progress at all, 
except in one or two exceptional States,” she went on, 
“ is so slow as to be utterly disheartening. I depre- 
ciate none of the efforts which are being made to 


370 


SAVED 


restrict the traffic and warn the people against the 
use of a substance which yields no single benefit, 
but curses wfith unutterable woes every one on whom 
its blight falls — they all have their measure of good 
— hut, while we wait for the agencies of repression, 
thousands, and tens of thousands are perishing 
around us. Shall we stand off and see these wretched 
men and women so perish while we seek to influence 
legislation, and wait for a new public sentiment that 
shall lessen the evil in some far-off time to come ? 
Shall a man, whom an effort on my part might save; 
die at my door, and I be guiltless ?” 

“ There are many agencies of reform and means 
of rescue in active operation, as you are well aware, 

Mrs. K said Mr. Stannard. “ Our inebriate 

asylums and reformatory homes are saving a large 
number of men.’* 

“ For every man that is so saved, I thank God, 
and bless the agency that saved him,” was answered. 
“ But what impression can less than a score of such 
institutions, scattered here and there over the land, 
excellent as they are, make upon the six hundred 
thousand drunkards Mr. Granger has just told us 
about ? Are these to be left to perish, while we are 
trying to establish more asylums for their treatment 
and cure ? There must be quicker, readier and less 
costly means for more than four out of five of these 
six hundred thousand, or they are lost forever.” 

“You, and the noble women who are at work 
with you in the cause of reform and restoration, 


AS BY FIRE. -371 

are giving us, I trust, a solution of this great 
problem.” 

“ God is giving the solution,” replied Mrs. K , 

in a low, subdued voice. “ In our blindness we went 
to Him, and He showed us the way. We called 
upoil Him in our weakness and our despair, and He 
beard and answered us.” 

Mrs. K spoke with a confidence of manner 

that brought a look of wonder to the face of Judge 
Arhuckle, and caused him to lean a little forward in 
his chair. 

“You men may continue to fight this foe of intem- 
perance with carnal aids to warfare, if you will, hut 
we have found in the Sword of the Spirit the most 
effective weapon that we can use against him,” Mrs. 

K continued, a soft smile just touching her 

lips, to show that she did not mean any discourtesy 
by her form of speech. 

“What do you mean by the Sword of the 
Spirit, madam ?” -asked the judge, as he leaned 
towards Mrs. K , and looked at her still curi- 

ously. 

“ Prayer and faith,” she replied. 

“ Oh ! I see,” he returned, with a slight betrayal 
of amused incredulity in bis voice. “ Prayer and 
faith are used as a kind of exorcism by which the 
devil of drink is cast out.” 

“ If you choose to put it in that form, judge,” the 
lady answered, with a smile still lingering on her 
gentle lips. 


372 


SAVED 


“ And you really believe, madam, that prayer will 
make a drunken man sober ?” 

“No, I do not believe anything of the kind.” 

“ What then ?” asked the judge. 

“ I believe that God will do it in answer to 
prayers.” • 

“ In answer to your prayer ?” 

“If,” asked Mrs. K , “there lived in my 

neighborhood a man who had become miserably 
drunken; who wasted his earnings in liquor, and 
neglected and abused his wife and children ; and I, 
pitying his state, and earnestly desiring to save him, 
should go to the Lord and present his case, and 
pray that His Holy Spirit might strike conviction 
to his soul, and give him not only to see the dreadful 
sin he was committing, but lead him to repentance ; 
and suppose that, after I had so presented him to 
the Lord, for a single time, or for many times, he 
should repent, and turn from his evil course, and 
be gathered into the fold of Christ, what would you 
say ?” 

“ Have you ever known such a case ?” asked the 
judge. 

“Yes; and not only one, but many, each, of 
course, with its peculiar aspects and incidents, but 
all quite as remarkable as the one I have given.” 

“ There is something more in this than appears 
on the surface,” remarked the judge, “ I do not 
believe that God was waiting for your prayers before 
He would lead the man of whom you speak to 


AS BY FIRE. 373 

repentance and reformation of life. What is youi 
view of the case ?” 

“ I know,” replied Mrs. K , “ that all things 

are promised to those who pray, believing ; and I 
know, that after I had prayed, in the case I have 
instanced, and in many other such cases, God has 
brought conviction and repentance. Just how it 
was all done, I do not pretend to know. I am not 
so much interested in the philosophy of this salva- 
tion as in the glorious fact And I am not alone. 
Judge Arbuckle, in my experiences. Hundreds of 
pious women in this city, and thousands more all 
over the land, are saving poor drunkards by scores 
and hundreds through the power of faith and 
prayer. If you could be with us in our daily 
meetings, and see the men whom we are rescuing, 
and hear them speak of the power of Divine grace 
in setting them free from the slavery of appetite, 
your heart would be so stirred within you that you 
would accept the fact of the value of prayer, and leave 
the philosophy to be discussed and settled hereafter.” 

“ If you can lead a man to pray for himself, and 
he then gain, through prayer and intercession, the 
power to resist and control his appetite, I can see a 
clear relation between cause and effect,” said the 
judge. “ He comes voluntarily into a new attitude 
towards the Lord, who ean now give him grace and 
strength, because he is ready to receive it. But 
how the prayer in which he has no part can have 
any avail, passes my comprehension.” 


374 


SAVED 


“We wlio are in the midst of this great Gospel 
temperance work are so crowded with surprising 
instances of the effect of our prayers for others — 
even for men and women whom we have not seen, 
whose names often we do not know, nor sometimes 
their places of abode — that doubt is no longer possi- 
ble,” Mrs. K replied. “And when, at our 

daily afternoon prayer and experience meetings, we 
make requests of God for those who ask for our in- 
tercession in their behalf, we do it in full confidence 
that we shall be heard and answered, though noth- 
ing of the result should, in many cases, ever come 
to our knowledge.” 

The deep calmness of a settled conviction was seen 
in the countenance of Mrs. K , as she spoke. 

“We know so little of the spiritual world that 
lies in and around us,” said Mr. Stannard, at this 
point of the conversation, “ and of the laws which 
govern therein, that we must not be surprised if some 
of its phenomena are found difficult of explanation. 
We cannot, knowing as we do, that God is infinite 
and essential love, and that His compassion is so 
great that our compassion in its tenderest move- 
ments bears no ratio to it whatever, believe that He 
withholds His saving power from any sin-sick and 
perishing soul until we ask Him to be gracious. 
But rather that, in our prayers for and thought of 
the individual for whom we pray, spiritual forces or 
influences, whose action is above the region of our 
knowledge, are set in motion, as the atmospheres 


AS BY FIRE. 


375 


are set in motion by the concussions we call sound, 
and so thought and feeling be stirred and acted 
upon, and he for whom we pray be led to turn to 
the Lord, whose ears are always open to His chil- 
dren’s cry for, help, and whose hands are always 
stretched out to save.” 

“ Be that as it may,” remarked Mrs. K — ^ “ I 
am not wise enough to say whether Mr. Stannard’s 
view be right or wrong ; but this I know, wonder- 
ful results follow the prayers we offer to God, and 
men whom we are asked to pray for to-day- 
drunken, debased and evil men; husbands, sons, 
brothers, for whom our prayers are asked by wives, 
mothers and sisters — often, within a day or a week, 
present themselves at our meetings, or at other 
places where Gospel meetings are held, and sign the 
pledge, and give their hearts to Christ. And so 
long as we women see these results, we should con- 
tinue to pray mightily to God.” 

A few moments of thoughtful silence, and then 

Mr. Stannard said, addressing Mrs. K : “I 

know all about what you are doing in this city, and 
the great success of your work ; and I see in the 
organization of a kindred work in every city, town 
and neighborhood all over our country, the largest 
and most effective agency of temperance reform ever 
known in our liquor-cursed land. My only fear is, 
that you may depend so completely on prayer, and 
faith, and Divine grace, in the work of saving 
drunkards, that you will fail to use the natural 


376 


SAVED 


means of reform and restoration that are as essential 
to permanent cure as the others.” 

“A woman’s instincts are SAvift and true, Mr. 
Stannard,” was the reply. “ We know that a man, 
with hunger gnawing at his stomach, is in a poor 
condition for effective praying ; that if he be home- 
less and idle, he is especially exposed to temptation, 
and the feeble spiritual life he may have found will 
he almost sure of extinguishment in its foul breath. 
We know that health must come back to the body, 
and its orderly life be restored, if we would keep 
down the _ old craving desire, and give to spiritual 
forces an unobstructed sphere of action. While we 
believe in prayer, and the grace of God, and a 
change of heart, we believe also in the saving power 
of natural and physical health, and order as well. 
The man to be truly saved must be saved within 
and without. But, with God’s grace in his heart, 
he will find the work of keeping his outer life in 
order a far easier task than if he tried to do it in 
his own strength. And herein it is that our work 
is meeting with such large success. We point the 
poor, exhausted inebriate, who comes to us in his 
rags and defilements, to Him who is able to save, 
and urge him to cast himself upon His love and 
mercy. To make new resolves and new pledges; 
but with this difference from the old resolves and 
pledges, that now prayer is added to the new reso- 
lutions, and spiritual strength asked humbly and 
trustingly from God. We take him to the church- 


AS BY FIBE. 


377 


door, and invite him to enter and cast in his lot 
with religious people ; helping him to form a new 
external, as well as a new internal life. He is 
thus removed from old, debasing associations, and 
brought into fellowship with pious people, who take 
him by the hand, and if he have any ability for 
Christian work, find him something to do in the 
Sunday-school, in the prayer-meetings, in the tem- 
perance work of his neighborhood, or in anything 
else that is good and useful.” 

“And this is what you mean by Gospel temper- 
ance,” said Judge Arbuckle, his fine face hghting 
up beautifully. 

“ It is one of its phases,” answered Mrs. K . 

“And the best and most promising phase. I’ll 
warrant you,” returned the judge, with rising en- 
thusiasm. “ Why this is church work ! I’m a good 
churchman, you see, madam ; and believe, with- our 
excellent bishop, that all saving reforms should 
originate in, and be fostered and carried on by, the 
church.” 

“What if the church, in its organized form, 
neglects, or wholly ignores temperance work — even 
Gospel temperance work — what then? Shall we 
wait for the church and let the poor drunkard perish 
because she neglects her duty ?” 

“ God forbid !” responded the judge. “ There is 
no monopoly in the work of lifting up fallen hu- 
manity.” 

“ Nor in soul-saving,” said Mr. Stannard. “ But 


378 


SA VED 


this drift which, the subject has taken, brings us face 
to face with the church and its great responsibilities. 
It has something more to do than the provision of 
a Sunday service for the people. The preaching of 
the Gospel is one thing, and the doing of Gospel 
work another. The building of stately church edi- 
fices, with costly finish and exquisite ornamenta- 
tion, into which so much of the pecuniary means of 
a congregation are absorbed, as to leave it too often 
with a sense of poverty and an excuse for drawing 
the purse-strings more closely, when suffering or 
destitute humanity stretches forth its pleading hands, 
may be all well enough ; but worship in a less 
expensive and ostentatious building, and a more 
Christ-like concern for the sick and perishing souls 
that lie helpless, it may be, within the sound of its 
choir and organ, would, I think, be far better and 
more acceptable to God,” 

“ You do not approve, then, of the splendid 
churches and grand cathedrals which, in all Chris- 
tian countries, have been erected to the honor of 
God and dedicated to His worship?” said Judge 
Arbuckle. 

“ Not if they are built and maintained at the cost 
of human souls.” 

“ I am not sure that I reach your meaning, Mr. 
Stannard.” 

“ Let me give an illustration. We will take the 
case of a congregation which has built for itself a 
splendid marble or brown-stone church at a cost of 


AS BY FIRE. 


379 


one, or two, or three hundred thousand dollars, into 
which the people come twice every Sunday to hear 
the service and preaching, and once or twice a week 
for evening prayers or a lecture. This elegant 
structure is an ornament to the neighborhood, and 
the people Avho have built it feel proud of their fine 
edifice, and not a few of them contrast it, a little 
dej^reciatively, it may be, with the achievements of 
certain sister churches in the same line, and take 
credit to themselves for having thrown these just a 
trifle into shadow. Now, as to the spiritual value 
of all this — and no good is gained in any church 
work unless it be a spiritual good — there may he 
serious doubts. Has the creation of a grand temple 
for the worship of God wrought in the minds of 
those by whom it was erected that state of receptive 
humility which is the dwelling-place of Him who 
says, ‘ I am meek and lowly of heart ?’ Are they 
humble, more teachable, more self-denying, more 
self-forgetting, more given to good works than 
before? What if, like a wise corporation, one of 
these congregations had invested in their land, 
building and required church machinery, just one- 
half of the sum they had in possession, and reserved 
the other half for working capital ? Don’t you see 
how difierently the case would stand ? Here is a 
church that cost two hundred thousand dollars. 
Now, if it had cost but one hundred thousand ; and 
a building just as large and just as comfortable could 
have been erected for that sum — all the excess is 
24 


38G 


SAVED 


but imposing display and ornamentation — that COU' 
gregation could have established and maintained, 
with the other one hundred thousand dollars, a 
reformatory home for inebriates, like the Franklin 
Home of our city, and been the means of saving 
from fifty to a hundred fallen men every year. Or, 
it could have placed in the hands of its pious 
women, who, like Mrs. K and her sister work- 

ers in this Gospel temperance movement, which has 
already wrought such marvelous results, the money 
required to give healthy food, and sightly clothing, 
and safer and better surroundings to the poor, 
nerveless, appetite-cursed men they are seeking to 
save. I instance but these ; there are many other 
ways in which the reserved working capital of this 
church might be used for the good of souls. Think! 
How would it be if our blessed Lord were to stand 
.some day in the midst of that congregation ? Would 
they hear from His lips, as His eyes took in the rich- 
ness and grandeur of the temple they had built to 
His honor, and then, penetrating its stately walls, 
went searching among the poor, desolate homes, and 
wretched hovels, and dens of vice and crime that 
lay in the very shadow of its beauty, and saw His 
lost sheep perishing there, with none to pity or to 
succor — ^would they hear from his lips the words, 
‘ Well done V I fear not.” 

“ You have struck the key-note of the great ques- 
tion that lies at our door to-day,” said Mrs. K , 

speaking with a rising earnestness of manner. “Are 


AS BY FIRE. 


881 


the churches, established for the salvation of souls, to 
remain content with one or two Sunday services, 
and a week-night prayer-meeting or lecture, main- 
tained, in many cases, at an expense of from five to 
fifty thousand dollars a year? Can you find in any 
mere secular calling so large an investment with 
such meagre returns ? The theory seems to he that 
the work of the chuch, as a body of Christian men 
and women, is limited to Sunday, and may be inter- 
mitted for six days.” 

“ Let us he careful that we are not unjust,” Mr. 
Stannard replied. “ I stated my case strongly, in 
order to illustrate my views. Many of our churches 
are active in good works, and are‘ doing much for 
the spiritually destitute. They have their mission 
schools, and visiting committees, and laborers among 
the poor ; but with most of them their usefulness is 
restricted for lack of means. It takes so much to 
maintain Sunday worship that but little is left for 
anything else.” 

“ To seek and to save that which was lost. It was 

for this that Christ came.” Mm. K spoke in a 

low, earnest voice. “Ah ! if our churches all over 
the land would give themselves to this seeking and 
saving of the lost — of those who have fallen so low 
that, to common eyes, their ease is hopeless. Would 
go out into the wilderness, like the Good Shepherd, 
seeking for and bringing back the lost sheep. These 
six hundred thousand drunkards, of whom over a 
thousand die every week; what hope for them if 


382 


SAVED 


the church comes not to their rescue ? — for the church 
alone can lead them to the sure refuge of Christ. 
The world knows Him not. Only in a few cases is 
a human hand strong enough to save. If the larger 
number be not led to take hold upon Christ, they 
must perish in their sin and degradation. . Think 
what joy there would be in Heaven, if all the 
churches in the land, singly, or in union with near 
sister churches, were to establish Gospel temperance 
meetings, and draw into them these six hundred 
thousand men and women — or as many of them as 
felt their slavery and wretchedness and wished to 
escape therefrom. The very thought makes my 
heart stir within me.” 

The evening had worn away, the hours passing 
with little ^heed from any of us, until it was time 
to separate. The judge had risen to his feet, 

and Mrs. Arbuckle and Mrs. K were moving 

from the parlor in order to make ready for 
going away, when Mr. Granger, who had been 
silent for most of the time, said, in a voice that 
at once gave him an attentive audience : “ I 

would like, before we part, to say one or two 
things that have come crowding into my mind this 
evening. All good work is from the Lord. Every 
effort, of whatever kind, perfect or imperfect, which 
has for its end the saving of men from evils and 
disorders, has in it a heavenly power and the 
approval of God ; and we must, therefore, be 
careful that, while we magnify the means of salva- 


AS BY FIRE. 


383 


tion, which to us seem most effective, we do not 
depreciate or throw hindrances in the way of those 
who labor in different fields, and with methods 
different from our own. This work of saving the 
people from the curse of drink, in which we are all 
so deeply interested, has many aspects, because men 
differ not only in personal character and tempera- 
ment, hut in their external conditions and the ways 
of thinking and habits of life, which grow out of 
these conditions. The influences that will power- 
fully affect one, may have little weight with another. 
Our panacea, in which we have such an abounding 
faith, may fail in many cases where another remedy 
would work a cure ; while cases of failure under a 
diverse treatment from ours may find a quick 
restoration on coming into our hands. Let us, then, 
be watchful over ourselves in this matter, and be 
readier to give a ‘God speed’ to methods different, 
and, it may be, less eflicient than our own, than to 
depreciate them by comparison, or hurt their influ- 
ences by direct condemnation. Whatever tends, in 
even the smallest degree, to abate this curse, must be 
recognized as good work. It may be through re- 
strictive laws, or binding pledges, or social organiza- 
tion, or appeals to the people by the press and the 
platform, or the opening of cheap coffee rooms. It 
may be in Christian work and prayer, and direct 
spiritual help from God through these appointed 
means, in which I have the strongest faith. It may 
be in the establishment of inebriate asylums and 


384 


SAVED 


reformatory homes, where, while seeking to cure by 
medical, sanitary, moral and religious means, the 
pathology of drunkenness is carefully studied, and 
the skill and wisdom of the medical profession 
brought to the examination and cure of one of the 
most fearful diseases which man, by self-indulgence, 
has brought upon himself ; involving in disorder, as 
it does, his physical, moral and spiritual nature. 
Tolerance of views and harmony of action are what 
we need in this work. If I think my methods are 
best, let me pursue them with all zeal and confi- 
dence, doing what good I can; only let me be 
careful not to depreciate my brother’s methods, of 
the scope and value of which I may know far less 
than I imagine.” 

“ Thank you, Mr. Granger !” came with a hearty 

utterance from the lips of Mrs. K , who had 

turned back into the parlor, from which she was 
passing when our host began his remarks. “ You 
have said the right thing in the right way. The 
temptation to magnify our own particular work, 
because its fruit is so near our hands, is very great. 
But, apart from this ; are not some ways of doing a 
thing better than other ways ? In the work of sal- 
vation, is not a Divine Hand more certain to save 
than a human hand ?” 

I saw a light break suddenly from within into 
Mr. Granger’s face. 

“ If we can lead the man, in whom inebriation 
has almost, if not entirely, destroyed the will-power, 


A8 BY FIRE. 


385 


to Him who is able to cure him of all diseases, if 
he will accept the means of cure,” continued Mrs. 

K “may we not hope to do more and better 

for him in this than in any other way ?” 

“ Yes, yes, I believe it, and I know it,” replied 
Mr. Granger. “When all other means fail, this 
may be held as sure ; for God’s strength, if we take 
it and rest upon it, never fails.” 

“ But, after all,” spoke out Judge Arbuckle, “ is 
not the work of warning and prevention better than 
the work of cure ? Of all that I have heard this 
evening, and much of it has been deeply interesting, 
nothing has impressed me like the evidence brought 
by Dr. Gilbert against alcohol. It may be only 
imagination,” and he smiled a little dubiously as he 
said it ; “ but I’ve recognized in my sensations more 
than half a dozen symptoms of its deleterious effects 
since he described its action on the tissues, nerves 
and organs of the body.” He stretched his arms 
upwards, then drew them down again slowly, 
pressed one hand against his forehead, and then 
held it against his right side. 

“ The fact is,” going on, after a few moments of 
reflective silence, “ I have an unpleasant impression 
that I’m not quite as sound as I thought myself. 
This torpidity of liver is something, I’m afraid, more 
serious than I had supposed. And my head,” giving 
it a shake, “ isn’t as clear as it ought to be. There’s 
often a heavy, confused feeling about it which I 
don’t like.” As he stepped out to move across the 


386 


SAVED 


room, I saw Mm limp. “ One of my knee-catchers 
again.” The judge made a slight grimace. 

“A diminished supply of sinovial fluid,” remarked 
Dr. Gilbert. 

“One of the efiects of old age,” said the 
judge. 

“Anticipated, most likely, by the alcohol in your 
wine and brandy,” returned the doctor. “You 
know that, of all substances taken into the body, 
none absorbs water like alcohol, and that its first 
action on the membranes is to rob them of as much 
of this fluid as it has the power to appropriate. 
That more or less torpor and stifihess of the joints 
and limbs should come in consequence of the con- 
tinued use of this substance is not at all surprising ; 
nor that the liver, heart and brain, and some of the 
more important nerve centres, should suffer from 
disturbances growing out of unhealthy structural 
changes.” 

“Not at all — not at all,” answered the judge. “ The 
thing stands to reason. What I wish to say, is, that 
as prevention is better than cure, how more effect- 
ually can the cause of temperance be served, than 
by the most thorough dissemination of the truth in 
regard to the action of alcoholic drinks in deterio- 
rating the body and laying the foundation for painful 
and too often fatal diseases ? Why, sir, do you think 
that, if I had known as much about this matter 
when I was twenty-one years of age, as I do now, 
that I would have joined the great army of moderate 


A8 BY FIRE. 


387 


drinkers? No, sir! It was because I believed, 
with thousands of others, that these enticing bever- 
ages were good and healthful, when not taken in 
excess, that I used them. Now 1 see that there is a 
double peril. That, besides the risk of becoming 
their slave, he who uses them is surely laying the 
foundation for troublesome, painful, and, often, fatal 
diseases.” 

“ It is in consequence of the physical deteriora- 
tions wrought by alcohol in the stomach and brain,” 
said the doctor, “that appetite increases, and the 
will so often loses power over it. For this reason, no 
one is safe who drinks at all ; for a double disease — 
moral, as well as physical — is almost sure to be the 
result; and this is the hardest to cure of all dis- 
eases.” 

“And yet the easiest,” spoke out Mrs. K , in 

her clear, sweet voice, “ if one will only come to the 
Great Physician, and be healed by the touch of His 
hand.” 

The judge let his gaze rest, for a moment or two, 
on the speaker’s calm face and slightly upturned 
eyes, and then, as he withdrew them, said, gravely : 
“ Prevention is best, my friends. Don’t forget the 
boys and the young men, while you are trying to 
save the unhappy fallen. Conservation is in the 
line of true order. And, remember, that it will 
cost less of time, effort and money to keep ten from 
falling than to lift up and restore one who is down. 
Don’t forget to provide safeguards for the ninety- 


388 


SAVED 


and-nine, while you axe going after the one lost 
sheep.” 

“ I think,” said Dr. Gilbert, as he laid his hand 
upon Judge Arbuckle’s arm, “ that we may count 
you as upon our side of this great question.” 

“ I should not wonder if it were so,” replied the 
judge, “ for I regard the argument, so far as pre- 
sented by you, as complete ; and, until I am satisfied 
that you are in error, I shall take no more risks. 
Too much of comfort, and use and happiness depend 
on good health, to put it lightly in jeopardy. My 
wine may be very pleasant and exhilarating, but if 
there be really poison in the cup, I must, as a wise 
and prudent man, let it pass untasted, or acknowl- 
edge myself the slave of an appetite that will have 
indulgence at any cost.” 

“And you, Henry?” It was the voice of Mr. 
Granger. He spoke with a quiet cheerfulness that 
concealed any suspense or concern, if either existed. 
Young Pickering, who was bending towards Miss 
Granger, and talking to her, in low tones, turned 
his handsome face towards the speaker. “On 
which side of this question shall we count you ?” 

“On the right side, of course,” said Amy, not 
waiting for her lover’s reply, a happy smile rippling 
over her face as she spoke. His answer I did not 
hear ; but that it was entirely satisfactory, I had the 
assurance a few weeks later, when the fact of their 
engagement became known to the friends of the 
family. 


AS BY FIRE. 


389 


And here our story must end, if so meagre a plot 
and so light a thread of narrative can be called a 
story. "Whatever interest has been felt in the char- 
acters, must give place now to the profounder con- 
victions we have sought to awaken. In the curse 
and cure of drunkenness lie problems, to the solution 
of which we must bring neither prejudice, nor pas- 
sion, nor partisan feeling, but the truth, if we can 
but find it ; and in all questions that concern man’s 
moral and spiritual life, as well as his natural and 
physical condition, we shall be more apt to find the 
truth, if we consider the action of moral and spiritual 
laws, in their connection with the effects that lie 
lower and more on the plane of common observa- 
tion, than if we made light of them, or ignored them 
altogether. 

There is one fundamental doctrine of Christianity, 
without which all the rest must go for nothing. 
We have.it from the mouth of the Lord Himself: 
“Ye must be born again.” Differ as we may about 
the means of attaining this new spiritual birth, all 
Christians agree tljat it involves an inner change 
through the gift, or grace, or co-operative agency of 
the Spirit of God, by which man’s evil nature, with 
all of its depraved and debasing appetites, is either 
taken wholly away, or removed from the centre to 
the circumference of his life, and there held in 
complete subjection. There is no condition of de- 
pravity or wickedness from which a man may not 
be saved in this new birth ; and there is no power 


390 


SAVED 


in all hell strong enough to bear him hack into his 
old evil life, if he use the new spiritual strength that 
has been born in him from above. 

On this fundamental law of spiritual life, all Chris- 
tian believers stand ; and it is being more and more 
widely accepted as the one on which we can most 
surely depend in our efforts to save men from the 
curse of drink. It is on this conviction that what is 
known as the Gospel temperance movement is based; 
a movement in which the old, tireless workers in the 
great cause of reform find new hope and encourage- 
ment. Heretofore the churches have held themselves, 
in too many instances, aloof from active participation 
in the cause of temperance, leaving it to be dealt with 
by legal enactment, or moral suasion. But now 
they are beginning to see that this work is really 
their work, and that to them has been given the 
special means for its prosecution. In most, if not 
all, of our inebriate asylums and homes of reforma- 
tion, the value of spiritual aid is fully and practi- 
cally recognized ; and in some of the larger institu- 
tions they have their chaplain as well as their 
physicians; and we are very sure that where the 
physician of the body and the physician of the soul 
unite in their efforts to cure a patient who is sick of 
an infirmity that has exhausted his body and en- 
slaved his will, his case is far more hopeful that if 
he were left in the care of either alone. 

And now, what need to write another sentence ? 
We cannot make clearer, by any new illustrations, 


AS BY FIRE. 


391 


this leading thought of our story, that in coming to 
God through sincere repentance and earnest prayer, 
refraining, at the same time, from drink and all 
other evils of life, as sins, there lies for the inebriate 
a road to reformation, in which he can walk safely, 
and which will bear him farther and farther from 
danger with every step he takes therein. Some 
have fallen so low— alas, for the number! — that 
every way except this has been closed ; but all will 
find it the safest, the surest, and the easiest by which 
to reach an abiding self-control. 




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